EDITORIAL
Oily climb !
Oil prices in the recent
times have been the most unpredictable, most undependable
and the most vital aspect of modern economies. It has
been described as the unfathomable hole that can drain
the most robust economies dry. In an energy driven
economy, of which oil constitutes nearly three-fourths,
oil price can just not be ignored. Sluggish prices go to
automatically boost the economic balance while a rough
and rising oil market puts the well-balanced ones into
disarray. That is what is beginning to happen to the
manly oil-planning of this budget. A slack market had
encouraged a liberalisation of oil prices. After years of
heavy oil-pool deficits the finance minister had tried
some decontrol by letting the prices of major energy
inputs, diesel and petrol, find their level. That was the
rosy period of stable prices when the crude stood at US $
20 per barrel and was poised to go down. After
dismantling of APM, the price of diesel and petrol
actually came down. Stable prices might have smoothened
the way for removal of the oil subsidy, and allowed the
free-floating of oil prices to stay.
But that was not to be.
Even as the finance minister may have been trying to find
some way to balance the roll back of the LPG price, the
crude price have come to strike the budget-balance the
hard way. The prices, which have already hit 23-dollar
mark, are poised to go still up. If they settle at 25
dollars, it would mean a straight increment of over three
rupees per liter in the prices of diesel and petrol.
Apart from the cascading effect, the increase in itself
is big enough to upset the plans of financial mice and
men. The situation is not helped by the fact that, over
the last several years, the component of indigenous
production has been steadily going down percentage-wise
though there may be an increment in the real terms. Much,
therfore, would depend on the forthcoming OPEC
ministerial meeting, but the real determinator would be
the American attitude towards Iraq. It has been the clear
belligerence of the US against Iraq, with the possibility
of a real war precipitating that has seen the present
spurt in the oil prices. Especially when neither the Arab
world, nor other nations see this new 'war'as having any
justification.
The 'revolt' in the
British labor party MPs over the commitment of British
troops for the 'war' is a clear indication of the mood.
Indeed, there does not appear to be much to substantiate
the American offensive being mounted against Iraq for its
refusal to weapons' inspectors. For the past several
years the weapons' inspectors have been seen as clear
meddlers but in the wake of Afghans operations. America
seems to have found a 'reason' to take on Iraq. And as
the possibility builds up, the oil prices are beginning a
wild-dance. With that the world economy would see another
era of turbulent convulsions. But if the immanence of war
recedes the market may stabilize again and the careful
computation of the finance minister may stand. One can do
little here except keep the fingers crossed and pray for
that reason to prevail.
Parliament's langauge
Once upon a time it used
to be civilized language and uncivil tongue. Usually it
meant how the literates and commoners spoke. But now
anything does for the civil life, while the halls of
Parliament have to be kept properly sanitized. In fact,
with that other concern with being 'politically correct',
the Parliaments have come to be the most controlled
auditoriums where the speakers have to be vastly
circumspect both with regard to the issues as well as the
manner of raising them. It is a moot point how far that
goes to ensure that there would be no bar on the right of
expression in these highest of forums of public debate.
But more important is the removal of these houses of
public opinion from the common tongue and style. Today
you can put the most banal expressions in print but
cannot mouth them if you are speaking in the legislatures
to which no censors applied. As for the literature,
nobody now insists on any restraint. Indeed, the degree
of unrestraint both in language and description is one
measure of truth-fullness and hence virtue and worth
there. But not so with the parliamentarians. They must be
removed from the common phrase and idiom and must state
their cases in measured tones with carefully chosen
worlds as well as a 'correct' choice of issues. And
thereby must bid good-bye to their truth and spontaneity.
Are the common people so
'undesirable' that the lingua they use cannot be allowed
without the codes of the parliamentary behaviour bearing
down on them? From that linguistic and political
sophistication comes sophistry where the representatives
end up pleading causes and concerns that are far from the
minds of their constituents. Peoples' representatives
cannot be more rational, more 'civil', and more
dispassionate than their constituents. Or, else they
cease to be representative and become lordly rulers who
alone know, who alone can decide because they speak with
alien mannerisms. In a way, the representatives in our
country have come to be far removed from the people they
stand for. They are alienated from the people and their
cares and concerns or quickly learn to be so. They either
are not 'representative' or quickly give up being ones.
Of course, it would not do to have Parliament become a gali-galooch
bazaar, but it would not be quite a desirable
thing to have long lists of 'un-parliamentary' words and
phrases. If unavoidable, those lists should be as short
as possible. It should not read like the literary
dictionary, a must for the writer and a no-no for a
speaker! Yes, if a member thinks that another member or
minister is a 'fraud' he should be allowed to say so. It,
after all, is the true State of his mind and must be
given expression. Let those houses be de-sanitized and
brought to the level of the commoners if they are to be
representative.
|
Future
of terrorism
By Satyabrata Rai
Chowdhuri
In order to assess
the future threat posed by terrorism one must
bear in
mind the changes which have made terrorism a
dreadful new force in the world order today.
The main changes
are transport and communication, weaponry, the
effects on society of concentration of vital
functions on a decreasing number of critical
nodes, and changes in social structure and
attitudes.
With the
advancement of science and technology,
developments in these areas have made terrorism a
different and more sinister threat that it had
been in the past. The question for the future is:
will these magnify the threat?
Transport and
communications sectors are unlikely to see
significant improvements, at least in the near
future, which may have major implications for the
scope and incidence of terrorism.
Whilst particular
targets in these areas may become more
attractive, the changes which gave terrorism
greater impact have already taken place. The ease
of movement around the world has been made
possible by the expansion of the airline
industry, in particular, and the spread of ideas
and ease of relaying news of terrorist incidents
made possible by advanced communications.
It is the fast
development in weaponry and their spread that
spells the greatest danger. The rate of turnover
of conventional weapons by the world's military
forces has increased dramatically in recent times
and many of these weapons are finding their way
into the open market.
It is inevitable
that in the future any determined group will be
able to purchase or steal powerful, conventional
weapons. Given the rate of improvement in weapon
making the arms which will find their way into
the hands of a large number of terrorist outfits
will be able to operate from a considerable
distance from the target and with significantly
increased accuracy.
Osama bin Laden's
claim that he has in his possession nuclear
weapons may not be taken as a bluff.
The fact that a
number of states are now involved in backing
terrorist groups than in the past also means that
it is easier for terrorist groups to gain access
to sophisticated arms in significant quantities.
The increasing
involvement of states with terrorist groups means
increasing availability of various forms of high
explosives which are extremely powerful in
relation to their bulk and which can be moulded
to fit into any shape or cavity, thus making them
easy to conceal, and difficult to detect by
conventional screening.
Some
counter-measures are now available or being
developed to counter this particular threat. As
detection capability becomes more refined, so are
explosives' evasive capabilities. That means a
totally successful screening will never be
possible.
While there is a
strong case to be made for responsible
governments to legislate to mandate the inclusion
of microtaggants (tiny chips conveying
information about the type, manufacturer, batch,
seller etc.) in explosives at the time of
manufacture which would facilitate their
detection, tracing and identification, the
reality again is that many countries will
continue to supply untagged explosives to
terrorists.
Given the
increasing trend towards the use of explosives in
terrorist attacks and the sophistication, power,
and availability of these substances, we can
expect thatbombs will become an even more
important weapon in the terrorist arsenal in the
future.
To many people,
the most frightening prospect for the future is
that terrorist groups might gain access to, and
use, weapons of mass destruction, specifically,
nuclear, biological or biochemical weapons.
Most attention to
date has been directed to the possibility of some
form of nuclear material falling into terrorist
hands. There are a number of readily conceivable
scenarios. One would involve the terrorist
seizure ofa nuclear facility under threat of
having the facility sabotaged, thus releasing
radioactive material over a large area.
Given the level of
security that has been shown to exist at some
nuclear power plants in the past, it is not
impossible that a determined group of
well-equipped and well-organised terrorists could
assault and take over a nuclear facility. If Al
Qaeda could make an assault on the Pentagon,
seizure of a nuclear power plant is comparatively
an easy job.
Other scenarios
involve the acquisition of a nuclear weapon y a
terrorist group. A number of possibilities exist
here. One is that a nuclear weapons state may
supply a terrorist group with such a weapon.
Theoretically, more likely is the theft of a
nuclear device from a military storage point.
The fact that a US
rocket could be smuggled out of West Germany, as
occurred some yeas ago, indicates that subterfuge
sometimes may also be successful.
In addition, the
proliferation of battle-field tactical nuclear
weapons means that there are simply many more
relatively portable nuclear devices that may be
more difficult to protect from falling in the
hands of rogues.
Probably,the most
controversial possibility is that of terrorists
being able to make their own crude nuclear
device. Experts differ as to the feasibility of
such a project.
However, much of
the data needed to design a nuclear bomb are now
freely available, as was documented by a highly
publicised television science programme which in
March 1975 featured a 20-year-old undergraduate
from Massachusetts Institute of Technology who
had designed a technically conceivable nuclear
bomb.
It would appear,
then, that a sufficiently dedicated terrorist
group could overcome the technical difficulties
and construct a credible nuclear bomb. In all
probability the capability already exists- and if
not, it will soon be.
There can be
little doubt, then, that it will be soon possible
to mount a credible terrorist attack involving
nuclear, biological or biochemical agents.
The one factor
which holds back this eventuality would appear to
be a rational calculation concerning what would
be achieved by such an act. It is generally
conceded that terrorists make rational
calculations and that these show the use of mass
destruction weapons to be counter-producive. Will
this be so in the future ?
The future looks
bleak as far as forms of political violence in
general, and terrorism as a specific technique,
are cocnerned. Many of the factors that have led
to the elevation of terrorism as a serious threat
to open societies will be exacerbated in the
future.
PTI Feature
|
Orissa
Panchayat Elections
Congress victory
makes Navin jittery
By Dr Bhabani Dikshit
While in the
recent Assembly elections, the Congress gained
majority in Punjab and Uttaranchal and formed
Governments; the voters of Orissa rejected the
Biju Janata Dal (BJD) and the Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP) in most of the areas in the recently
held three-tier Panchayat elections in
February-end, thereby ringing a warning bell to
the ruling BJD-BJP alliance.
The results of
Panchayat elections in Orissa shows a departure
from earlier trends. In most of the Panchayat
elections in the past, the ruling party used to
get around 80 percent or above votes. In
1992,when Biju Patnaik was the CM, his party got
90 per cent seats, whereas Congress got ony 10
per cent. In 1995, when J.B. Patnaik came to
power, the Congress got more than 87 per cent
seats in 1996 panchayat elections, whereas the
Janata Dal got just 13 per cent. As per this
trend, BJD-BJP alliance should have swept in this
panchayat polls. But as it has not happened, the
ruling alliance Government faces a grave
situation, having lost the credibility to govern.
The panchayat poll
results indicate that the Congress has improved
by gaining an impressive 42 per cent votes
against its earlier 34 per cent in the Assembly
elections in 2000 and 37 per cent of the 1999 Lok
Sabha elections, whereas the BJP has got merely
28 per cent votes, a fall of 8 per cent from the
last Assembly elections and 5 per cent loss from
the 1999 Lok Sabha elections. The BJP also
performed miserably in this panchayat elections,
fetching only 19 per cent when it had got 26 per
cent votes in the Assembly elections and 25 per
cent in the Lok Sabha elections. By improving its
past electoral performance the Congress has
proved itself to be closer to the masses at the
grassroot level, thereby making a dent in the BJD
-BJP's mass base.
The Congress has
gained 299 Zila Parishad (ZP) seats, whereas the
BJP 180 and BJD 287 seats. Due to non-allowance
of the party symbols at the last moment by the
polling officials on some pretext or other, 14
Congress candidates had to contest independently
though they were allocated party symbols by the
Congress authorities. All of them have won.
Out of 30
districts, the Congress has already gained
majority in 13 and the BJD has got 9 and the BJP
in 4. The BJD and the BJP had entered the
panchayat poll battle throughout the State on
party basis, though they have an alliance
Government in the State. Interestingly, in
Bargarh and Nawrangpur ZP's, there they fought
jointly, even there they have lost.
During the
electioneering, there have been allegations of
Youth Congress workers and office-bearers of the
opposition Congress party being detained in many
districts by the police. The DCC president of
Deogarh was detained for a while night in the
police station in fake charges. Many Congress
leaders complained that the State Government to
resorted to this method just to harass and
prevent leaders of other parties from
electioneering. Due to allegation of large-scale
booth capturing, repolls were conducted in 485
booths. Two Congress activists were allegedly
murdered in Berhampur, Ganjan district.
The people of
Orissa had tremendous expectations from the
present CM Navin Patnaik, who they fought would
serve them with vision and dedication. But they
got disillusioned with his style of functioning
in these two years and were waiting for an
opportunity to strike. In the meantime, the
Congress president Mrs Sonia Gandhi, appointed
Sarat Patnaik, a firebrand youth leader of
Western Orissa, to head the Orissa Pradesh
Congress Committee. Just within 4 months of his
induction, Patnaik concentrated on exposing the
failures of Navin Patnaik Government. The new PCC
president, having a strong organizational
background, enthused and mobilised the youth by
touring 314 blocks of the State. He organised big
'Save Orissa' public rallies and agitation
exposing the ruling coalitions' misgovernance.
Patnaik, alongwith senior Congress leaders toured
22 out of 30 districts within a span of three
months.
According to
political observers, the swing in favour of the
Congress can be attributed to a large extent to
the organisational spadework done by the young
PCC chief Patnaik, who managed to bring together
all factions of the party. The Congress party
focussed on large scale unemployment; distress
sale of paddy; closure of industries like OTM,
OPM, parivatisation of PPL and many sugar mills;
fees hike for students; introduction of
veterinary fees; professional tax; non-payment of
monthly salary to Government employees; scrapping
of Rs 2 per kg rice scheme; ouster of 11,000
teachers; costlier kerosene; and retrenchment of
45,000 employees through VRS, out of a total 5
lakh employees etc.
All these issues
coupled with the vital economic crisis that led
to a Congress victory. Presently, according to
the 11th Finance Commission report, the total
internal revenue and debt ratio is 46 per cent in
Orissa, whereas in other States these are around
24.33 per cent. This has now increased to 51 per
cent, the debt burden being Rs. 23,000 crore.
Without Central assistance, Orissa treasury's
bankrupt position cannot be remedied and for
this, an interest on loan to the tune of Rs.
3,100 crore has to be paid annually. The State
Government expects to get an additional Central
assistance of Rs. 1215 crore. The Finance
Minister Rama Krishna patnaik, while introducing
a second additional budget in the Assembly,
estimated receipt of Rs. 4581.33 crore for this
financial year. Out of this amount, Rs 4,000
crore will be in the form of overdraft. The
balance of Rs. 541.62 crore will have to be
allocated for plan and non-plan expenditure (Rs.
506.53 crore + Rs. 35.9 crore). Ever Mr M M
Rajendran the Governor of Orissa, conceded that
"the State is passing through an
unprecedented economic crisis" in his
address to the Assembly budget session.
Ultimately, the
people have to shoulder the burden of any
financial mismanagement and the consequent
economic crisis. Their mood is reflected in the
election results, whether they are for the Lok
Sabha, Assembly or Panchayats. When asked for
comments on peoples' verdict on panchayat
elections of Orissa, the PCC president Mr
Patnaik, told, "The election results
indicate Orissa voters' full confidence in the
Congress party and its leader Mrs Sonia
Gandhi."
The pattern of
Congress suggests that people are fast losing
confidence in the present BJD-BJP Government.
"Is it not disrespect to the voters of
Orissa that the BJP and BJP fought separately in
the panchayat elections within two years of their
rule together, the after seeking a mandate to
govern the State jointly in the Assembly
elections?" quipped Mr Biswabhushan
Harichandan, Revenue Minister and leader of the
BJP Legislature Party. He says that the Congress
has been allowed to take advantage of the
breaking up of the BJD-BJP alliance. It is
curious that even the BJP State unit president
Man Mohan Samal went to the extent of saying that
BJP had done well by not aligning with the BJD.
On the other hand, a senior BJD leader Dr Mamodar
Rout categorically said that heavens would not
fall if the BJP withdrew from the alliance.
Significantly, in
a panchyat polls review meeting of BJP, many
leaders blamed BJD for the former's setback. Even
many BJP leaders asked as to how BJD could spend
so much black money when the CM projected himself
to be clean man. It is reported that the BJP has
resolved to strengthen its organization for
preparing itself to contest municipal elections
singlehanded.
It is not without
reason that the State Election Commission has
expressed concern over blatant use of money in
the panchayat elections and sought necessary
amendments in the panchyat act to curb the role
of filthy lucre in the grassroot polls.
The Commission
also took serious not of widespread violence
during the polls.
Apart from the
wranglings of BJD and BJP, the aggressive polls
management of the Congress helped the party to
expand its existing base and more towards
regaining what it had lost earlier.
-CNF
|
Pearl's
murder a death song for Pakistan
By Sreedhar
The killing of
Wall Street Journal correspondent Daniel Pearl by
jehadis in Pakistan raises three fundamental
questions? First, why was he killed? Many of us
following the developments in Afghanistan for the
past few years feel that the killing of a western
journalist is a subtle way of conveying a message
to the US and its partners in Operation Enduring
Freedom - leave Pakistan. Otherwise, some more
such gruesome developments are likely to happen
in the weeks to come.
In the same
breath, the killers of Pearl are exposing the
total ineffectiveness of Pakistani President Gen.
Pervez Musharraf to control them in any fashion.
If the details reported in the Pakistani media
are to be believed, Omar Sheikh, one of the prime
accused in Pearl’s murder, first went and
surrendered to Lt Gen Aziz, the Chairman, Joint
Chief of Staff Committee, and not to the Interior
Ministry or the police. Lt Gen Aziz is reported
to have briefed Omar Sheikh how to face the court
and the way the accused must confess in the
court.
Interior Ministry
efforts to keep the trial in camera were thwarted
by the Karachi judge. All this indicated that
people in the know of things wanted the world to
get the impression that Gen Musharraf is not the
boss of Pakistan. Whatever the US may say about
Gen Musharrafs cooperation in tracking down the
culprits, the ground situation and developments
of the past few weeks show that both are
different. Either Gen Musharraf is playing games
with the "gullible Americans" or he is
helpless in fighting jehadis.
Who killed Daniel
Pearl is not important at this point of the war
against terrorism. It is a matter of detail and
for the process of law to take its due course.
The killers of Pearl are aware of the fact that
they may be caught; and if caught they will be
hanged. The Talibanised jehadis visualize
that any sacrifices they make for their cause,
including death, will take them to martyrdom.
Therefore, death sentence is not going to be a
deterrence for them.
A section of the
elite among the jehadis, knowing fully well the
consequences of Pearl’s killing started
distancing themselves from the act. But people
like Maulana Masood Azhar, the chief of
Jaish-e-Mohammad, have not come out openly and
condemned it. The Taliban leadership now in
Pakistan also refused to condemn it. Above all,
people like Omar Sheikh in their confessions in a
court of law justified their actions and
expressed readiness to face the consequences. All
this indicates that the jehadi outfits operating
under the new garb of National Movement for
Restoration of Sovereignty of Pakistan are
willing to go to any length for the removal of
the US from Pakistani soil.
How the US is
going to respond to this new situation is to be,
seen. Even after almost six months of bombing of
Afghanistan, the Jehadis have not given up their
habits of terrorism and violence, that is the
fact.
The last question
that needs to be answered is, how General
Musharraf is going to react to this new
confrontation from jehadis. From whatever little
one knows of the personality of the man from his
friends and acquaintances, he is a great
survivor. If this is true, he will be doing a
fine balancing act between the US demands and
jehadi assertion, not to displease anyone at this
point of time.
Already, the US is
discreetly letting it know that they will demand
from Pakistan, extradition of Omar Sheikh, but
will allow the Pakistani law enforcing
authorities to handle him first. In all
probability, even Maulana Masood Azhar’s
(the teacher of Omar Sheikh) extradition will be
demanded by the US; and Pakistan has no option
but to agree to it also.
In these
circumstances, what would be interesting to see
would be the course that the war on terrorism
would take. The people responsible for 1 1
September 2001 bombing are at large. It is
becoming increasingly clear that Pakistan-Taliban
Al-Quaeda (PATAAQ) leadership that planned and
executed on 11 September 2001 acts of terrorism
and violence are hiding somewhere in the border
areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. They are
active and are mobilizing the cadres for
retaliation.
Therefore, there
are few choices before Gen. Musharraf. Whether
jehadis like it or not, he must stop this
regrouping of PATAAQ leadership. If he failed to
do so, the inevitable is bound to happen - that
is, the US bombing of the areas presumed to be
hideouts of PATAAQ leadership. Any such US action
would have far reaching consequences for Gen
Musharrafs rule in Pakistan. That would also be
the beginning of the end of Gen Musharraf
The other related
issue is what would be the future course of the
National Movement for Restoration of Sovereignty
of Pakistan, and what will be the next move of
Pearl killers ? If the Movement gains further
strength in the coming months, it is bound to
confront Gen Musharraf, questioning even his
legitimacy.
This clearly shows
that troubled times are ahead for Pakistan. lf
the New York Times report of 40 per cent
of the Inter Service Intelligence Agency
personnel being sympathetic to jehadis and
working with them is to be believed, the
unfolding situation in Pakistan has all the
potential of getting explosive which can even
lead to a civil war. - CNF
|
 |
E-dumping:
Polluting India
By Arvinder Kaur
Millions of pounds
of electronic waste from obsolete comput-ers and
televisions is generated in the United States
every year. And, a major part of this electronic
waste, or the e-waste, is being dumped in India.
Huge quantities of
these hazardous wastes are being exported to
India, China and Pakistan, where they are
processed in operations that are extremely
hazardous to the human health and environment.
The facts, brought
out recently by an international coalition of
environmental organisations - The Silicon Valley
Toxics Coalition- has raised an alarm among the
environmentalists here who say it is a crisis not
only of quantity but also a crisis born from
toxic ingredients such as lead, beryllium,
mercury, cadmium and brominated-flame retardants
that pose both occupational and environmental
health threats.
Dumping of
hazardous waste is not legal in India and is
controlled by the Hazardous Waste Import
Regulations. But authorities are not able to do
much as all this is a part of the waste trade and
the electronic material comes in the guise of
recycling. But environmentalists say it is
essentially dumping.
It comes exactly
through same channels as other waste materials
come either through brokers in West Asia or at
the ports from where big traders buy it, send it
to the backyard of small recyclers.
After going
through the chain of traders, the old computers
and TV sets are broken down, the metals taken out
through extremely crude methods- chips are simply
burnt with nitric acid, and the waste is simply
drained, which is extremely hazardous.
The circuit boards
too are burnt, the plastic goes to the plastic
recycler which the metal extracted is used as raw
material for other industrial purposes. But all
this does no happen in a scientific way.
Recycling in India
is an urorganised sector activity, where no
scientific procedures or professionals are
involved. The situation is no better in other
Asian countries where these materials are also
dumped.
Field
investigation in China, India and Pakistan
revealed that vast amounts of e-waste, both
hazardous and simply trash, was burned or dumped
in the fields, irrigation canals and along
waterways.
Environmentalists
say all this fills air with toxic carcinogenic
smoke besides polluting the water bodies also.
The transfer of
hazardous waste is restricted by a 1989 treaty
known as the Basel Convention but the United
States has not ratified it.
The growing amount
of computer waste is becoming a big problem with
millions of these devices becoming obsolete every
six months.
The average
computer platform has a life span of less than
two years. Particularly in the more advanced
economies, it is cheaper and more convenient to
buy a new machine than to upgrade an old one.
There is no other option but to dump them in the
developing countries.
According to a
recent US study, over 315 million computers will
become obsolete by the year 2004. And by 2005,
one computer will become obsolete for every new
one put on the market.
Lot of what
actually is coming to India are non-functions
printers and computers when have very little life
left or are not workable. A small quantity of
these is picked up by the deales and sold in the
market as second hand computers.
The big question,
however, is: for how long will this dumping
continue and what is the way out ?
Experts say
electronic dumping is a problem of the industry
too and it is they who will have to find ways and
means to check it probably on the same lines as
car recycling.
Some countries in
the west have made it mandatory for car owners to
take back old cars and recycle the materials for
producing new ones.
The electronics
industry too will have to think on the same lines
in the long run and dumping cannot continue
indefinitely. The need of the hour is thus to
design computers and other electronic gadgets in
such a way that they can be recycled tomorrow.
The European Union
has initiated a step in the direction and could
be worth emulated by others. With an annual six
million tons of electronic waste clogging
Europe's dumps, the European Commission has
proposed drastic measures to require producers to
take back and recycle electrical and electronic
equipment including computers, mobile phones,
televisions, refrigerators and washing machines.
The proposals
reflect growing concern within the EU over the
growing mountains of waste that darken this
heavily populated region. The Union introduced
recycled requirements on all packaging in the
early 1990s, and has formally adopted legislation
to require recycling of moor vehicles.
Electronic waste
in Europe currently constitutes only four per
cent of the total municipal waste, but it is
growing by almost 30 per cent every five years,
or three times as fast as the average growth o
Municipal waste. Ninety per cent of the
electronic waste currently ends up in disposal or
shredding without any pre-treatment.
The proposals on
e-waste recycling would also ban from the year
2008 the use of certain substances including
lead, mercury, cadmium and brominated flame
retardants widely used in making these
equipments.
If the measures
are approved by the European Union member states,
consumers would be able to return their equipment
free of charge to manufactures who would have to
set up separate collection and recycling systems
for such waste.
But till that
happens in EU and others follow, we will have to
live with this cyber-age nightmare of e-dumping.
PTI
Feature
|
|
|
