Plans to monitor pollution at source |06 September 2005

This will entail installation of monitors along the exhaust stacks of factories that generate gases capable of fouling the air.

Seychelles will this week be discussing the proposal to do that with potential funding agencies who are currently involved in the running of a five-day workshop at Victoria Hospital, on ambient air quality monitoring.

The director general (DG) of the Seychelles Bureau of Standards (SBS) Terence Cooposamy said this on Monday at the start of the workshop which is being conducted by experts from the World Health Organisation (WHO) consultants Professor Ahmed Nejjar, Dr Imo Obioh, Dr Dieter Schwela along with locals scientists from SBS.

“We are seeking both technical assistance in the form of capacity building which will cover training and acquisition of sampling equipment,” the DG said, noting that among the desired monitoring sites are the exhaust flues of the Victoria electricity generating station.

He said the Indian Ocean Tuna factory already has such monitors in place.

Mr Cooposamy nevertheless told the participants of the workshop who are drawn from different arms of government concerned with environment conservation that measurement of air quality in Seychelles has been going on since 1998 and the quality of air here is very good and quantity of pollutants is below the recommended maximum WHO levels.

Mr Cooposamy said there is an ongoing research project which was initiated in the early 1990s by the Japanese International Cooperation Agency through which ambient air quality is monitored.

“We place our monitors in town near the Codevar building and we have noticed that pollution from motor vehicles is highest on Saturday mornings,” he said, adding that SBS checks for total suspended solids, traces of the metal lead, and oxides of nitrogen.

He said that the introduction of unleaded fuel some years back dramatically reduced the amount of lead detected in the atmosphere.

When opening the workshop, the director general for community health, Dr Jude Gedeon, said that air that is polluted has health consequences on people and may result in adverse effects which can be immediate, like asthma exacerbation, or long term, as in certain cancers.

“Many organisations have realised the importance of monitoring the air that we depend on for our existence. It is only by keeping a close watch on what is happening to our ambient air, that effective corrective and preventive measures can be instituted,” he said.

WHO liaison officer, Dr Rui Gama Vaz, said that as the United Nations prepares to Mark 60 years of its existence this week, he is proud of the achievements this country has realised through WHO, and pledged that his organisation will continue to support Seychelles’ efforts towards maintaining and improving on its health service delivery.

Among those who attended the opening ceremony were the Minister for Health and Social Services Vincent Meriton and the principal secretary for Health Maurice Loustau-Lalanne.