Federal cabinet approves Hajj Policy 2023

ISLAMABAD: The federal cabinet meeting presided by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday approved the Hajj Policy 2023 and Pakistan’s first-ever National Clean Air Policy, ARY News reported.

PM Shehbaz Sharif ordered the concerned authorities to prepare a comprehensive and effective strategy in collaboration with officials of Saudi Arabia in order to provide the best possible travel and accommodation facilities to Hajj pilgrims.

He praised the Ministry of Climate Change for formulating the Clean Air Policy and directed take the necessary steps for its effective implementation.

According to the Air Quality Index Report 2022-23, Karachi and Lahore were the cities most affected by air pollution. It mentioned that due to air pollution, the average life of people was reduced by 2.7 years.

As per the 2016 report of the World Bank, Pakistan’s economy was suffering huge losses because of the air pollution problem.

In recent years, the number of accidents caused by smog in cities and different diseases spiralled.

The Ministry of Climate Change prepared an extensive policy covering a number of subjects, including the protection of the health of citizens, steps to reduce per-year deaths, promotion of agriculture, reduction in air pollution and for improvement in the quality of air in urban and rural areas.

The policy recommended encouraging and promoting the upgradation of fuel from Euro 5 standard to Euro 6, introducing strict laws to control industrial emissions, modernising agriculture, effectively stopping the burning of crop waste, adopting international standards for waste management and using low-emission gases in cooking.

The adoption of the policy would decrease the emission of poisonous gases by 40 per cent in the next 10 years.

The effective enactment of policy would be ensured by a National Action Committee, which would provide long-term guidance for its implementation and also bring changes in it after every five years keeping in view the ground realities.

A technical committee would also be constituted to come up with a strategy to ensure the execution of the policy and send periodical reports to the National Action Committee.

The committee would also present recommendations to remove obstacles in the way of the implementation of the policy.

Execution of the clean air policy could lead to an increase in the average human life in Pakistan by two years.

The cabinet was also briefed on a strategy for fuel conservation. It was told that the ministries of Power, Petroleum, Industry and Commerce and Information were ensuring on a priority basis implementation of the targets set by the cabinet.

On the recommendation of the Ministry of Law and Justice, the National Accountability Amendment Ordinance 2023 was approved.

The recent amendments in the National Accountability Ordinance 1999 had created legal complications because of which it became difficult to transfer a lot of cases which did not come in the ambit of the NAB ordinance, to other courts, tribunals and forums.

After consultation with all stakeholders, the NAB Ordinance XVIII was amended after which the accountability courts would get a legal cover to transfer cases to other courts and forums.

The amendments would also end the perception that those cases which did not come under the purview of the NAB Ordinance, were decriminalized.

The cabinet also ratified the decisions made by the Economic Coordination Committee during its meetings held on March 1 and March 6.

It also ratified the decisions taken by the Cabinet Committee for Legislative Cases in its meeting held on March 6.