Together for better

The Cairo centre to monitor pollution is a laboratory for measuring environmental pollution levels, and it was opened in Cairo last week in a ceremony presided over by Salah Hafez, executive chairman of the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency (EEAA). Part of a 10-year work plan initiated in 1992 by the EEAA with a total investment of $1.500 million, the laboratory aims to supply accurate figures for air, water, soil and sound pollution over an area covering some of Egypt's most polluted regions - including Cairo, Giza, Fayoum and Qalyubiya.

Japanese aid
These statistics will enable the government to identify areas of especially high pollution and eventually pinpoint and prosecute factories violating the environment law. The $6 million laboratory is a joint venture with Jaica, a Japanese aid grant entity. "Technical cooperation between Japan and Egypt will be important to guarantee the success of this project," said Mawaheb Abul-Ezz, the laboratory's director.

During its first five years, she added, Jacia would send a total of 19 experts to help run the laboratory. Egypt would also send engineers to Japan for extra training in monitoring environmental pollution. The laboratory, Abul-Ezz said, is the largest and most advanced centre of its kind in Africa and the Middle East, and includes facilities for chemical, biochemical and heavy metals analysis. "This is only the first phase of our project," she added. Another eight laboratories are to be opened in the near future in Alexandria, Suez, Tanta, Mansoura, Assiut, Hurghada, Luxor and Aswan.

The central laboratory will serve as a training centre for researchers who are to work in the branch laboratories. It will also compute and coordinate results on a national level, and it is planned that the laboratories will eventually work together to provide a national environmental monitoring network. Regional laboratories, EEAA chairman Hafez said, would be supplied with specialized equipment. The Suez branch, for example, is to have equipment for monitoring petroleum pollution. Some of the newly-opened laboratory's equipment is portable, which will enable researchers to gauge pollution levels in very localized areas. "This will help us make on-the-spot investigations into factories reported to be violating environment law," stated Hafez.

The statistics obtained from monitoring would provide the government with information about performance of factories, thus enabling them to guide and control pollution emissions pursuant to the environmental law. The laboratories, therefore, would enable the government to enforce law, and, in the long term, help reduce pollution levels.

"Our researchers would instantly move in if they had reports of violation from a reliable organization or the national environment network," said Hafez. Attached to the central laboratory will be an information centre which will include precise information about which factories cause pollution in various parts of the country. The centre will aim at establishing a cooperative relationship with factories in the area, promoting the concept that environmental protection is for the benefit of all.