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Pollution
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Kathmandu ranks among the world's most polluted cities. The
traffic and fumes
on its main boulevards are as bad as in Bangkok or Mexico City, albeit on a smaller scale. You wouldn't think it possible, let alone permissible, for vehicles to be so filthy.
In point of fact all motor vehicles (except motorcycles) registered in greater Kathmandu are supposed to undergo an annual emissions test , and only those that pass are entitled to drive on the main roads. Nevertheless, most vehicles pass, and the rest drive anyway. There are many reasons for the programme's failure, but they all come down to corruption. It's said that anyone can get a green sticker simply by slipping the appropriate bakshish to the tester. Tempos - the worst offenders - get around the regulations because most are registered in the names of police officers, whose job it is to enforce the regulations. The emissions standards are set low because, according to government logic, if they were set any higher too few vehicles would pass. Fines are trivial. Politicians don't intervene because they don't want to antagonize the transport industry. For its part, the transport industry blames the government for not building enough roads , and suppliers for selling low-grade fuel . And there's some truth to their arguments. Sixty percent of Nepal's vehicles are concentrated in the Kathmandu Valley, and their number has tripled in a decade, so the density of vehicles sharing the limited road space is increasing unsustainably. Result: traffic jams, slower circulation and still more emissions from idling engines. As for the fuel supply, a government report has estimated that 25-30 percent of petrol and diesel is adulterated with cheaper kerosene, causing vehicles to run even dirtier. It was partly to combat this practice that the government mandated a fuel-colouring system (red for petrol, blue for kerosene), but it's easy enough to get around that. All this contributes to particulate levels that are up to twelve times the World Health Organization's recommended maximum level in some areas. The particulates are themselves harmful to health, and they also carry lead (since petrol in Nepal is still leaded) and germs. The whole toxic brew not only irritates lungs and eyes, it also weakens immune systems and increases the long-term risk of various health problems. If you can help it, don't stay more than a couple of days in Kathmandu at the beginning of your trip. Otherwise you're likely to come down with a chest or sinus infection that will dog you for days and may be hard to shake if you go trekking Other useful information
for tourists (each section contains more specific sub-sections): |
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Nepal,
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