Govts must look beyond the costs of conservation

By T. Sima Gunawan

ISTANBUL, Turkey (JP): Governments should concentrate on the benefits of environmental conservation rather than be deterred by the costs, a senior World Bank official said yesterday.

The benefits far outweigh the costs, Ismail Serageldin, Vice President for Environmentally Sustainable Development, told a dialogue on Creating Healthy Cities in the 21st Century.

"Don't be obsessed by the costs," he told the meeting, part of the ongoing Second UN Conference on Human Settlements or Habitat II, which ends on June 14.

Air pollution is one of the major problems which inflict losses amounting to billions of dollars annually. Jakarta, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur suffers US$ 5 billion losses annually because of air pollution, Serageldin said.

Pollution is mainly caused by emissions from vehicles burning leaded gasoline, which is still widely used in Jakarta and many other cities in Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe.

Lead greatly affects people's health, especially of children, Serageldin said.

In Bangkok, between 30,000 and 70,000 children risk losing four or more IQ points because of the high lead levels, according to World Resources 1996-1997.

The report said air pollution is particularly pronounced in cities with large numbers of poorly maintained vehicles and widespread use of leaded gasoline. Pollution has led to chronic illnesses, such as asthma and bronchitis. The most vulnerable are children, the elderly, cigarette smokers and those who already have respiratory difficulties.

In Jakarta, where the concentration of harmful particulates is very high, the reduction of airborne particulates to the level recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) could prevent 1,400 deaths each year, about 2 percent of annual deaths in the city. Researchers estimate that compliance with WHO guidelines could prevent some 600,000 asthma attacks and 125,000 cases of bronchitis in children each year.

Serageldin called on governments to give greater priority to containing air pollution in an effort to cope with urban problems.

Local communities and the private sector should be more involved, he argued.

There is misunderstanding about the private sector, which is frequently accused as having the worst polluters, the firms who cause the most problems, he said. "But they are also part of the solution, an essential part of the solution."

The private sector invests between $116 billion and $118 billion in developing countries a year, he noted.

Seven years ago, official development assistance going from developed to developing countries was three times as large as all private sector flows. Today, the private sector flows are three or four times larger than all official development assistance going to developing countries, Serageldin said.

Governments have a responsibility to ensure that the flow of investment are environmentally friendly and socially responsible, he said.

Not only is the private sector the engine of nations' economic growth, and an essential weapon in the fight to reduce poverty, but it is also capable of dealing with the transformation of technology, he said.

"It is not true that environmental technologies that prevent pollution are going to prevent the competitiveness of the private sector," he said.

WHO Director General Hiroshi Nakajima said urbanization provides not only economic opportunities, but also "a multitude of disease vectors."

"Over-crowded peri-urban areas have become pockets for a multitude of diseases such as tuberculosis, acute respiratory infections and diarrheal diseases."

"Close person-to-person contacts, polluted air and contaminated water are the main pathways of disease transmission. All of these prevail abundantly in those city districts where the urban poor are crowded together in often dismal sanitary conditions," he said.

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