Egypt Targets Costly Air Pollution, Car Emissions
Date: 21-Apr-04
Country: EGYPT
Author: Opheera McDoom
State Minister for Environmental Affairs Mamdouh Riad Tadrus also said most of Egypt's industry conformed to European pollution regulations and those that did not were offered soft loans to improve their operations.
"Air pollution is our priority. Cars cause most of the pollution in Cairo," he told Reuters in his new ministry building surrounded by lush gardens, in stark contrast to the jungle of high-rise apartment blocks outside.
The World Bank estimates that environmental degradation from pollution costs Egypt on average five percent of its annual gross domestic product (GDP), amounting to some 15 billion Egyptian pounds ($2.42 billion).
The report in June 2002 said that percentage was twice that of industrialized countries, adding that air pollution was the highest cost to Egypt's already stagnating economy.
But Tadrus said the government was introducing a smart card system whereby a driver can convert their car for free to use natural gas, which he said emits less pollutants than gasoline.
They would then use the smart card to buy gas at the same price as gasoline and the money saved would pay for the conversion. Natural gas costs about half as much as gasoline.
"Already we have 55,000 cars running on natural gas...of 1.5 million in Cairo," he said.
Egypt is a growing gas producer, with proven reserves of 62 trillion cu feet.
BLACK CLOUD
New arrivals in Cairo are hit by the smell of fumes in a city where the sun disappears into a layer of smog before it can reach the horizon.
Added to this is a new phenomenon dubbed the "black cloud" which in October or November chokes the population on thick black smoke that environmentalists blame on farmers burning harvest waste products such as rice stalks.
Tadrus said the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency (EEAA) had made much progress in helping industry conform to strict Egyptian pollution regulations since environmental laws were first passed in 1994.
"Most of our factories now conform to these regulations," he said, pointing to a green glass vase he said was made from the waste by-products of cement production.
"Most of them we give a grace period to conform, then they ask for a loan. There are only a very small number that don't conform that we have to close," he added.
Analysts say Egypt's pollution causes cancer as well as other health problems, damages the environment and pollutes Egypt's lifeline, the river Nile and has given rise to the common belief that living in Cairo is the equivalent of smoking 20 cigarettes a day.