Officials in the capital closed a two-day national clean-air meeting on Thursday by endorsing the Islamabad Clean Air Compact, a pledge meant to tighten how agencies measure and cut capital air pollution.
Pak-EPA organised the gathering with help from development partners. Delegates included federal and provincial environment staff, teams from Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan, and international agencies. Talks covered fumes from traffic, factories, field burning, home cooking and rubbish.
What the Compact asks governments to do
The Compact presses Islamabad and the provinces to work in step, police existing rules more firmly, keep up-to-date tallies of what is emitted, and review results each year. Speakers said paper pledges will not be enough: funded programmes, named institutional owners and honest progress checks are required if air quality in the capital is to improve in practice.
Syed Abrar Hussain, Pak-EPA’s director general, said strategies must be shared across tiers of government, monitoring must get stronger, and agencies should prepare early for the haze that builds in the cold months.
Money, data and who pays
Wajid Ijaz of the Environment Protection and Climate Change Department argued that trustworthy measurements are the basis for regulation and for deciding where public money goes. He pressed for denser monitoring networks, emissions ledgers, studies that show which sources dominate, and live tracking so interventions hit the right targets. Money, he and others said, remains a central obstacle.
Andrew McCarthy of the Asian Development Bank urged agreement on what the centre versus the provinces must fund and do, and floated a National Clean Air Financing Framework to pull together budget lines, climate funds, donor support and private capital. Dr Waqas Ahmed Khan of the World Bank pointed to transport and farming projects that could draw investment through carbon credits, provided baselines, checks, safeguards and approvals are solid enough to stop the same cuts being counted twice.
Sector ideas on the table
On roads, delegates floated tougher vehicle checks, more places to recharge electric cars, wider public transit, smarter freight and heavier use of rail. On farms, ideas included farmer outreach, more machines, new uses for leftover stalks and stalks, and cash help so burning fields is less tempting. Industry talk covered continuous emissions checks, energy audits, cleaner kit and upgrades to brick-making ovens.
Clean cooking was flagged as urgent. Muhammad Abid of GIZ asked for solutions that fit local conditions, steady alternative fuels, public-private deals and openings for women-led businesses. Pak-EPA spokesperson Dr Zaigham Abbas called on partners such as the World Bank, ADB, UNICEF, GIZ and ICIMOD to back the National Clean Air Policy 2023 with technology that cuts pollution at the source.
Aasan alfaaz mein
Islamabad mein Clean Air Compact naam ka naya faisla hua hai. Hukumat aur provinces se kaha gaya hai ke pollution ki rok-tham mil kar karein. Winter se pehle monitoring aur funding dono zaroori bataye gaye. Aam logon ke liye matlab yeh hai ke traffic, factories aur khet jalaane se jo dhuaan aata hai, us par asar dalne ki koshish shuru ho sakti hai.
