Safety Issues in hazardous waste Management in Heavy Industries

Safety Issues in hazardous waste Management in Heavy Industries 

Sri Lanka was having an agricultural based economy before the emergence of market economy which was first introduced in the year 1977. The market economy helped the country to attract more industries which were nationally based and internationally owned.

Some of the industries introduced to the country were high electricity consumption industries (than 1 MW) also known as heavy industries (HI); such as iron scarp smelting (collection of scrap and melting them into furnace oil) Generating thermal power and manufacturing asbestos cement sheets. Although the above industries are vital for the economic growth of a nation, the hazardous waste (HW) generated by these HI were injurious to health. Hazardous waste could result in an increase in mortality or an increase in serious irreversible or incapacitating reversible illnesses. And also HW has been identified as a source which poses a substantial damage to the natural and built environment in a country. There are various types of HW such as heavy metals (such as Chromium, Cadmium and Nickel) Asbestos fiber waste, sludge from water treatment plants, slag from smelting factories and used oil were generated from heavy industries.

Sri Lanka (SL) did not have adequate and appropriate law and regulations to control HW until the year 1992. During this period an irreversible damage might have happened to the human life, animals or environment. As per the regulation introduced under the National Environmental Act No 47 of 1980 it is mandatory to obtain license to manage and dispose HW. Although the regulations had been gazette by Central Environmental Authority (CEA) stating improper disposal of HW is an offense, the existence of suitably licensed places to do the final disposal of HW remains problematic in SL.

With the present day tax benefits and concessions awarded by the Board of Investments (BOI) of SL, a large number of HI have been established in the country. Therefore an intervention of research personnel is essential to find out whether there are adequate and legitimate final disposal facilities for HW are available in SL to sustain its present day volume.

“What are the existing Hazardous Waste Management Practices in Sri Lankan Heavy Industries and what factors have an impact over those practices?”

 This focuses on identifying the existing hazardous waste management practices in the HW generating HI of SL. It will also look at the factors which have a positive or negative influence over the execution of those practices. While the market economy helps to boost the economy of a country, it intern will attract heavy industries which will generate various types of waste including Hazardous Waste as a result of their production process. Hazardous Wastes are always injurious to health and create adverse environmental effects.

Problems created by hazardous waste contamination can be controlled / managed by disposing them in a proper way in a suitable / technically constructed Hazardous waste disposal facility.

Sri Lanka does not have adequate facilities to dispose Hazardous Waste generated by Industries (Director – Provincial Environmental Authority –NWP). By the meantime the government of Sri Lanka had introduced stringent laws and regulations compiling industrialists on proper disposal of Hazardous waste.

Those industrialists are facing big problem due to unavailability of suitable hazardous waste disposal facilities while the law threatens them to dispose of hazardous waste in proper manner.

BASEL III IN LICENSED COMMERCIAL BANKS OF SRI LANKA

basel iii in licensed commercial banks of sri lanka

Since the early days of banking, it was identified that a uniform regulatory framework needs to be introduced to safeguard the global financial sector. With the exponential increase of international trade during the 2^nd half of the 20^th century, the need for international regulations for banking was more evident.

The Basel Accord has its origins in the financial turmoil of 1973. After the collapse of Bretton Woods’s system of managed exchange rates, banks worldwide faced considerable foreign exchange losses which led to banking supervisors globally to formulate a regulatory framework for the banking sector.

As a result the Basel Committee of Banking Supervision formulated a minimum set of requirements for the operation of banks in 1988 and the G10 countries adopted this framework in 1992. This accord was heavily criticized in subsequent years for measuring risk only in terms of credit. This resulted in the introduction of Basel II which had a more wide angled approach to risks faced by the banking sector. However with the financial crisis that occurred in Western Countries in 2007; the need of putting forward a new accord to replace Basel II was identified. The Basel III was first introduced in 2010/11 and was modified in 2013. This accord gives emphasis to areas like Capital Adequacy, Stress Testing and Liquidity Coverage.

As the March 2019 deadline for Basel III compliance looms ever closer, banks across the globe including Sri Lanka race against the clock to meet the requirements outlined by Basel III. In this research the main barriers and challenges faced by Licensed Commercial Banks in Sri Lanka and their relationship for the successful implementation of Basel III will be identified. Further methods to overcome these barriers and challenges will be briefly discussed.