The Anambra State Government has called for public co-operation towards achieving a sustainable environment especially as it concerns dealing with the challenge of air pollution.
In a press briefing to mark the World Environment Day, the outgoing Commissioner for Environment, Mr Mike Okonkwo underscored the need for joint efforts towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals: Thirteen, Fourteen and Fifteen respectively.
The theme for this year’s World Environment Day is “Beat Air Pollution” and with a recent report by the World Health Organization naming Okpoko and Onitsha as cities with challenging air pollution indices, there seems to be a need for the intensification of campaigns to end air pollution.
Addressing the Press, Commissioner Okonkwo who has been moved to the Ministry of Housing highlighted some of the sustainable waste management practices initiated by the Obiano administration including signing of different Memoranda of Understanding to actualize public-private engagements.
He emphasized that there is need for every member of the public to take urgent steps that will conserve energy and reduce the level of gas emission into the atmosphere.
On their parts, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Dr Emmanuel Okafor and the Director of Environmental Health and Pollution Control in the Ministry, Mrs Edith Ike, also revealed that they have put machineries in motion to revamp and make more effective the work of Environmental officers.
Earlier, as part of efforts to re-Engineer Waste Management System, Commissioner Okonkwo undertook a tour of ZEC Industries Company Limited where waste plastic bottles are recycled to Manufacture thread used in plating hair and for some other Domestic uses.
Taking the Commissioner and his entourage round the facility, the Managing Director of the Company based in Nkpor, Mr Chidi Ezelibe explained that the firm has a capacity of generating up to eight thousand-six hundred tonnes of waste annually and could expand to over twenty thousand very soon and also shared ways it could partner with the State Government.
According to him, ZEC Industries Company Limited is also working towards installing equipment that could make wigs and also use the plastic wastes to manufacture fabrics.
Waste, a major challenge at the heart of air pollution can only be addressed through concerted efforts.
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