Pollution: ENV to be revamped to become new ministry HQ

THE Environment Ministry (ENV) will be reorganised, in a move to give more focus and speed to the task of keeping Singapore clean and green.

Acting Environment Minister Urn Swee Say announced in Parliament yesterday that the ENV will be restructured into a “very lean headquarters with possibly three statutory boards”:

• A new Public Utilities Board, which he described as the “national water authority” taking charge of providing clean water.

• An environmental-health agency to take charge of the safety of food supplies, vector control to fight Aedes mosquitoes and public- health issues, such as infectious diseases.

• An environmental-protection agency to take charge of air quality and clean land.

The target is to have this done over 18 to 24 months, he said.

In his maiden Budget debate speech as Acting Environment Minister, Mr Lim also outlined his ministry’s strategies to protect and sustain the environment.

In the short term, the ministry wants to achieve higher international standards in areas such as emission control, vector control and waste management.

But over the years, it will also focus on “sustain- ability”, to support the long-term development of Singapore and its economy.

It would aim for clean air, clean land, clean water, safe food and low risk of infectious diseases, as well as to get Singaporeans involved in looking after the environment, he said.

Over the next 10 years, the ENV aims to:

•Step up recycling of used water from 5 per cent to 20 per cent, through the use of Newater, a kind of ultra-pure, recycled water.

•Recycle 50 per cent of solid waste, up from the present 40 per cent.

•Avoid any “massive” food- borne disease outbreak

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•Become a leading research and management centre for communicable diseases in the Asia-Pacific.

•Make Singaporeans more civic-minded.

He quipped: “We want to be a clean, green and fine city, but not a city of fines.”

Just following the three Rs to “reduce, reuse and recycle” to be more green was not enough, he said. He wanted a four-R strategy, with the fourth R standing for “recover”.

Summing up his strategies, he said: “We believe the environment is a closed loop ... what goes in must come out. We are ... talking about tying the two ends together. What we call closing the environmental loop.”