Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- At the forty-eighth plenary meeting of the Senate, information was provided on the activities carried out by the Ministry of Ecology, Environmental Protection and Climate Change of the Republic of Uzbekistan to protect atmospheric air and plant green areas while preventing climate change.

During the parliamentary hearing, it was noted that the issues of combating climate change in the country, mitigating its negative consequences, protecting atmospheric air, expanding green areas in the regions are included in the development strategies of economic sectors, as well as in the National goals and objectives of sustainable development.

The Paris Agreement is taking steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 35% per unit of gross domestic product by 2030.

It was noted that, as part of programs aimed at preventing climate change, 69 automatic stations for sampling and analyzing pollution sources from 44 industrial enterprises with a high risk of impact on the atmospheric air and 27 stationary observation points were installed in the surrounding areas.

This year, as a result of the repair and renovation of 716 dust and gas collection systems at 147 production and industrial enterprises, more than 10 thousand tons of harmful emissions into the atmosphere were prevented.

Together with the Zamin International Public Foundation, 2 stations for measuring fine particles measuring 10-2.5 PM in the atmosphere were installed in the city of Tashkent.

At 14 existing industrial enterprises, 32 dust and gas treatment plants with an efficiency of at least 95 percent were installed, and at 12 newly created enterprises with an efficiency of at least 99.5 percent.

As a result of the temporary stop of 2,914 vehicles as part of the Clean Air campaign, the release of 209,232 tons of pollutants into the atmosphere was prevented.

In addition, this year, 217 million seedlings were planted as part of the nationwide Green Space project. Around almost 189 industrial enterprises with a high level of environmental impact, 1 million 730 thousand seedlings were planted in “green belts”, and 135 thousand trees were planted around 196 waste sites and protective forests were created.

Nurseries have been established on an area of 650 hectares, suitable for the climate of the region and requiring little water. To provide water to the seedlings, 893 wells were dug and irrigation systems with a length of 1,058.7 km were installed.

It was noted that despite the work done on the ground, some problems and shortcomings remain.

Thus, as a result of an insufficient level of work to reduce the amount of pollutants emitted into the atmosphere, the volume of emissions has now reached almost 2.2 million tons.

Of the more than 6 thousand dust and gas treatment plants available at enterprises, the average cleaning efficiency of 60 percent of them is 86.5%.

Those responsible for the maintenance of 1.8 million seedlings planted in the spring have not been assigned. The fact that 7.3 million seedlings were planted in areas without irrigation systems was criticized, and the protection of trees from diseases and pests was insufficiently organized.

At the end of the discussions, the need was noted to reduce the level of air pollution in all regions of our republic to permitted standards, to take measures within the framework of international agreements and obligations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 35% by 2030 and to reduce methane emissions into the atmosphere by 30%, to install automatic measuring equipment for dispersed particles 10 –2.5 RM in cities and towns with developed industry. It was emphasized that it is necessary to take measures to increase the efficiency of dust and gas treatment plants of enterprises producing construction materials and industrial enterprises to 99.5%.

The need to organize appropriate work to create an electronic map of trees, accelerate work on expanding green areas, and reduce the number of construction and contracting organizations in the National Information System “Transparent Construction” that violated the requirements of the moratorium was also noted.

Instructions and recommendations are given on the transfer of vehicles to environmentally friendly energy sources, increasing the number of environmentally friendly vehicles, and paying special attention to increasing the efficiency of Clean Air measures.

As a result of the discussion, a corresponding resolution of the Senate was adopted covering these issues.