The FINANCIAL — “The environment sector is a very marginal one in Georgia.
It’s never been popular in Soviet times and after the collapse of the soviet system it has become marginalized,” said Nana Janashia, Executive Director at the Caucasus Environmental NGO network. “It seems there’s no willingness in the Government to do something about the environment,” she said.
“It’s not only the Government that’s to blame for it, but on the other side if there’s no demand from civil society, then the Government won’t follow. Moreover in the meantime in parliament – members have to show their commitment towards the issue and enact laws on it.”
Q. How do liberal policies followed by the Georgian Government play out when it comes to care of the environment?
A. The liberal policies which the Government follows are unfortunately “liberal” vis-à-vis environment care. The impression is that they think that environment protection is for rich countries to undertake. It’s a wrong perception though. The Government shouldn’t measure a country’s development by the level of GDP only, but also by the level of environmental conservation, healthcare, lifetime and everything combined.
Our government believes that the fewer regulations we have the more the country will win, which in fact isn’t true. When talking about investment attractiveness – lack of environmental laws won’t necessarily attract large companies worldwide as they know the value that’s after all generated from them. Such regulations will attract investments from Russia, China or Brazil, but will never work with investors from Northern American countries or Europe as they will know that if you go against the environment you’ll pay more in the long-term.
Protecting the environment pays back – this is what the developed world agrees upon.
The level of awareness is really low in Georgia. Especially in the rural areas of the countryside – e.g. waste is dumped with ignorance of the rules, ethics. In addition agriculture is poorly maintained in an unsustainable way. Even if you go to Adjara for instance you look at villagers and how they’re cutting down the forest above their village. They don’t have traditional knowledge about such things and finally it will lead to a landslide in the long-term.
Q. How about climate change, are countries taking caution from it?
A. The issue of climate change has become so apparent that a number of Scandinavian countries have already opened up new ministries of climate change as it’s really a priority for the Government.
What happens in Georgia unfortunately is that the mandate that the Ministry of Environment Protection of Georgia had is now delegated to other ministries. Now what stays with MOE is air protection, waste management but only on the policy level, biodiversity protection. They’re not responsible anymore for forestry, natural disasters, the latter is in fact handled by the Ministry of Interior Affairs, namely by the EMD (Emergency Management Department).
Q. Do we have laws to regulate air emissions by companies/industries in Georgia – and are they followed by them?
A. In Georgia we have a law on air quality and the industry is supposed to develop certain emission measures and then submit them to the Ministry of Environment Protection of Georgia. Once the company reports, an inspection group from the Ministry is taking raids every year. They’re not equipped with enough technical equipment, so what they do is that they rely on their eyesight.
This is why first we need to have relevant policies developed and management then we can make legislative reforms. This all is not very difficult but it requires will from the Government and the MOE is not feeling powerful enough to put it on the table.
Regionally Georgia has a diverse geographical shape and unique ecosystem. There are lots of species of animals which are found only on the territory of Georgia.
If we compare the pollution level across the region, Azerbaijan is the most polluted part as it is an oil rich country. In Armenia and Georgia there is a somewhat similar situation although Georgia has made much more progress in terms of protected area reforms, fighting corruption and things like that.
Q. How about the transportation system in Georgia, especially in the capital city Tbilisi?
A. The main reason why air quality is poor in the city and is getting worse is due to the lack of air filters on cars. There no longer exists technical inspection of cars. Custom regulation should also be fixed, meaning that if now new cars are taxed higher than older ones it should be vice-versa according to the age of the car. Second, taxes should vary according to the engine.
Another point about transportation is energy efficiency as well as travel routes efficiency. There is a practice of more energy efficient buses worldwide hence there should be many means of transportation in the city including bicycle lanes although in the latter case you need to have infrastructure or special cycle lanes where bikes can be ridden safely.
Bicycles are becoming more and more fashionable and widely used in European countries. Groups are gathering and trying to promote each other with different campaigns in their individual countries.
In Georgia it will also get popular. For instance 20 May is a day to go to work by bicycle.
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