EVERY year, as the weather gets colder, parts of the country, particularly Lahore and its peripheries, are choked by a toxic pall of smog. While transport is arguably the biggest contributor to air pollution, agricultural practices, specifically the burning of crop residue, has a 20pc contribution to smoggy air. However, as a recently released UN study titled Sustainable Management of Crop Residues in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Pakistan: Challenges and Solutions point s out, i f government s and farmers work together, more ecologically sustainable methods of using crop stubble can lead to less burning of residue, as well as economic benefits. The document also notes that along with contributing to air pollution, crop burning is also bad for the soil, as it depletes organic matter and nutrients.

Presently in Pakistan, crop residue is used primarily in animal bedding, garden mulch, heating fuel etc. As the UN report observes, wheat and rice straw are not used as industrial raw materials in the country on a mass scale. The fact is that farmers see burning as the easiest and quickest way to clear their fields, and prepare them for sowing the next crop. However, as noted above, these methods are having a hazardous impact on the environment, and need to be rethought. According to the report, farmers need to be made to realise `the real economic and commercial value of the crop residue`. One major economic use can be gasification and biofuel production using crop waste as raw material. India is actively pursuing biomass gasification.

If Pakistan were to adopt these technologies on a large scale, it could provide communities with relatively clean, domestically produced fuel, and help reduce the import bill. The state should take farmers on board to reduce crop burning, and use residue as an economic resource. Moreover, to have a visible impact on reducing air pollution, all the states of South Asia will have to work together to lower transboundary pollution.