Bangladesh Environment  Network

Home  |  Background  |  TOC |  Arsenic  | Air Pollution  | Climate Change | Coal & Gas  |  Forest & Adibasi |  Rivers  | Water Management  | Contacts

World Bank funds to fight air pollution in major cities - Auto-rickshaws may disappear in 4 years

By Shehab Ahmed (From Daily Star, 15th October, '98)

Pollutant auto-rickshaws may not be seen in major cities in the country four years from now if a project finalised yesterday goes ahead trouble free.

The World Bank (WB) is coming in aid of Bangladesh to fight air pollution in major cities. A government-WB deal aims to reduce emissions from three wheelers and other vehicles under a four-year programme, officials said.

The programme envisages phasing out the ubiquitous auto-rickshaws using a deadly cocktail of leaded petrol and engine lubricants, stricter check on emission by motor vehicles and promoting use of unleaded petrol and proper lubricants.

Earlier, the WB had suggested introduction of more buses, including premium services, to reduce air pollution in the city and improve public transport system.

The auto-rickshaws have been found responsible for 64 per cent of air pollution in the capital. Some 40,000 of them ply its streets, leaving clouds of smoke at rush hours.

Despite a move to reduce their numbers through higher duties on imports from this fiscal, unscrupulous traders made their way to import 3,500 of them this year.

A nationalised bank provided loans to import the vehicles using vintage technology of the 50s from India where the vehicles are banned in major cities as pollutants and being phased out in others.

Even Nepal banned them on Kathmandu streets, encouraging converted auto-rickshaws using electric engines.

But powerful importers and organised union leaders managed to bypass the government decisions, prompting a feud between the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA) and the Department of Environment (DOE).

Lately, DOE has requested BRTA not to issue these vehicles route permits to operate in major cities.

In this backdrop, the WB signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the government yesterday.

The US$ 6.5 million Air Quality Management Project in Bangladesh (AQMPB) plans to phase out the two-stroke-engine vehicles in four years, highly placed sources said.

"The idea is to actively push them out of circulation. The spares are going to be pricey from the next budgets onward," an official told The Daily Star.

On different aspects of the project, the sources said there would be check posts in different parts of the cities, where offending vehicles will be monitored and penalised.

But the owners would be given the opportunity to test their vehicles at workshops about the level of their emissions. The WB project would provide emission-testing equipment to government and private workshops.

The project also aims at establishing an air quality monitoring system to obtain data, evaluate results of the pilot projects and formulate a long-term strategy to reduce air pollution in Dhaka and other big cities.

The WB will provide equipment, laboratory facilities, and support training programmes and awareness campaign.