UNEP to conclude environmental assessment

Five teams of experts from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) are set to conclude a comprehensive assessment of the extent to which 23 years of war have impacted on Afghanistan’s environment - the first such effort in over two decades. "Based on our preliminary findings, the situation is worse than expected," Pasi Rinne, senior policy adviser for UNEP’s post-conflict assessment unit, told IRIN on Tuesday in the Afghan capital, Kabul. "In some areas, the environmental circumstances are so poor that the recovery will probably not happen during our lifetime." While the technical mission, comprising a total of five teams of 20 Afghan and international scientists and experts, began on 5 September - with the last team due back on 9 October - UNEP has been working extensively on capacity-building with the Afghan authorities since last spring. Over the past few months, the agency had been conducting workshops with the ministry of irrigation and environment to provide them with necessary information regarding international environmental conventions and legislative initiatives within the ministry, Rinne said. Such efforts are badly needed. Although the country boasts a rich heritage of biological diversity, its six protected areas cover less than one percent of its territory. It is estimated that up to 30 percent of its forests have been lost since 1979, so that less than two percent of the country remains forested. Rangelands, watersheds, and agricultural areas are also thought to be severely degraded. "We have a great deal of data to go through. After a thorough analysis, we expect to conclude our findings later this year," Rinne said. But given preliminary findings, he noted that Afghanistan suffered from "deep" environmental problems – including deforestation, drought and erosion. "Erosion is such a big problem that the carrying capacity of certain areas – how many people can live in certain areas – is now under threat," he warned. Sharing this concern was the UNEP project coordinator, Peter Zahler, who said water was a primary issue across Afghanistan. "The situation - with four years of drought - has only exacerbated the human impact on the environment at this point," he told IRIN. "That’s true not only in terms of water resources, but in terms of forests, soil and plant cover in general." Rinne added that ground-water levels had dropped significantly. "It’s not just that they have dropped, but ground waters are turning salty because of the little ground water that there is – coupled with erosion," he said. Moreover, drinking-water wells were very rapidly exhausting the ground-water surface, and their placement near sewage and waste areas was proving a serious health risk. "Wells have been drilled without any long-term thinking," he said. Meanwhile, in the urban context, one team examined pollution and solid and liquid waste in the major cities of the country. "There is essentially no waste management in the urban areas, or very little. Rural areas are slightly less problematic as you don’t have such a high density of population," Zahler noted. According to the expert, essentially every aspect of the environmental sector has been damaged by the combination of conflict and drought, and these in turn are all impacting on the country's recovery, rehabilitation and development - economic and otherwise. "Unless these environmental issues are addressed by the international community and government, no amount of money thrown towards the development and rehabilitation effort in Afghanistan is really going to succeed in the long run," he said. Concurring with this view, Rinne maintained that while the Afghan government was clearly working to establish an environmental policy – drafting necessary laws and legislative measures – they could not do it alone. "They are taking it seriously, but this effort must be coupled with international cooperation. The donors must take this seriously so the environment is well placed in the development assistance area."