PANAJI
Raising an alarm to the foul odour at five fish meal plants at the Cuncolim IDC, the United Goans Foundation (UGF) has asked the government to implement Centre’s guidelines on odour pollution and its control. They have also demanded that the government temporarily suspend their licences till the guidelines are met with.
The foundation has written to the Minister for Environment and Forest, the Chief Secretary, the Chairman and Member Secretary of Goa State Pollution Control Board (GSPCB) and the Chief Officer of Cuncolim municipality.
“These guidelines were issued by the Central Pollution Control Board on May 19, 2008. It is shocking to know that the GSPCB never implemented these guidelines in Goa even though there were several complaints of unbearably foul odour from garbage dump sites, wholesale fishmarkets, chemical plants, sewerage treatment plants, etc across Goa,” said UGF secretary Avinash Tavares.
According to Tavares, the five fish meal plants at Cuncolim IDC have been the cause of foul odour due to which people living in the surrounding areas of Cuncolim and Ambaulim have been facing breathing problems.
“These people have made several representations to GSPCB but they had been allegedly told by a top official at GSPCB that there is no tool invented to detect the smell. Upon investigation into these claims, we discovered that there are several devices available online,” he said.
In their letter to government authorities, UGF said, “The odour emitted is of rotten fish proteins which emits a mixture of Methyl Mercaptans and H2S gas. The guidelines clearly mention how to neutralise these chemicals but, judging from the odour emanating from the plants, none of the fish meal plants appear to have complied with the guidelines,” he said.
They have therefore demanded that GSPCB temporarily shut down these fish meal plants till they implement the odour control measures as mentioned in the guidelines.
