What the ecologists are waiting from the thrift activities?

On the occasion of declaring “The year of thrift”, the Council of Ministers of Belarus has approved an activity plan that includes measures to save the resources and protect the environment.

And though the independent ecologists haven’t been participating in the creation of this plan, we have asked them how successful are the measures suggested by the government and what help could the public organizations offer.

About the banners and the efficiency

The chairperson of the board of Public Association “Eco House” Iryna Sukhysays that she is skeptical about the general fuss around the “The year of thrift”. The expert believes that everything depends on the implementation of the programs, not their formal announcement and demands to fulfill the plans. First of all, we should change the attitude, inner motivation and understanding of why we should save anything at all.

The worker of the “Center for ecologic decisions” Natalia Parechyna also thinks that a lot depends on how responsible is the attitude towards the fulfillment of the state program aims. Personally, she looks favorably at the decision to make 2013 the year of thrift. She believes that this decision of Lukashenka demonstrates political will. However, it is very important to treat it with understanding and not to reduce the measures in the network of the “Year of thrift” to the thoughtless execution of orders.

Energy saving is impossible without modernization

The activity plan adopted by the Council of Ministers presupposes the elaboration of the normative act on economic stimulation of preservation of energy and metals. Do the heads of the enterprises understand the reasonability of saving and whether it is worth waiting for the modernization which will lead to the resources saving?

Iryna Sukhy notes that the means of production at the Belarusan enterprises are rather power-consuming. In order to save energy, modernization should be carried out. But for this we need the money of the investors and privatization to be carried out.

Natalia Parechyna notes that there is no doubt that this is a hard process, as modernization requires money; however, each enterprise has its plans of reaching it. Time has come a long time ago. Everyone is well aware of how rapidly the resources are rising in price. Another question is whether we understand how unsafe these resources are for the environment.

The problem of monopoly

Still, the expert notes that comparing to Europe, Belarusans are not occupied with the global ecological agenda, such as resources exhaustion, formation of waste products and excessive consumption. We have to work on this a lot.

Besides, the activity plan for the “The year of thrift” presupposes a number of programs for separate refuse collection. Special state program has been realized since 2009. What are the results?

The chairperson of the “Eco House” Iryna Sukhy notices that we can witness positive changes in this sphere; we are working actively in this direction. What concerns separate collection of the domestic waste, it requires great educational work with the population starting from children of the school age. The monopoly on the market (with the public industry “Belresursy”) complicates work for the private firms, too. And while such situation is preserved, the market is not working; while in other countries it is a highly competitive business.

Natalia Parechyna takes notice that transmission to the separate collection of waste and its further recycling is a prolonged process all over the world, not only in Belarus, which requires both the creation of such system and the change of people’s mentality. However, we are at a starting point now and there is certain progress. The best situation with the recycling is in the Belarusan capital; while very few things, except traditional waste paper, glass and scrap metal are recycled in the regions. The system is being refined, but there is no saying that is it already formed and works well, the expert is sure.

Information work

Special attention is attached to the information work with the population. Both experts are sure that the educational work in the sphere of savings requires great attention. Traditional banners and social advertisement created by state structures and public industries are not working any more.

The experts say that while all over the world people care about nature resources, in Belarus we still can trace the consequence of the so-called collective farming and excessive wealth, which resulted in general neglect in the use of the nature resources. When everything is declared to be common, then it means it belongs to no one; thus, no one takes care to keep and save it. And it is very important that people are careful with the food, water, electricity in their personal life. It is simple actions that are responsible for the success of the grandiose plans announced at national level. Natalia Parechyna also believes that it would be better if civil organizations were involved in the information campaign, as they possess fresh ideas and interactive groundwork.

Whether the authorities will turn to the independent ecologists is still unknown. However, the activity plan for “The year of thrift” has been adopted without their participation.