Problems and Prospects of Urban Environmental Management in Pakistan

Discussions on environmental conditions often assume that urbanisation contributes to the degradation of the environment. However, urbanisation per se is not detrimental to the environment. Concentrations of population and economic activities through urbanisation offer opportunities in providing environmental infrastructure and health services costeffectively, because of economies of scale. It also provides opportunities to effectively internalise environmental costs; because concentration of economic activities reduces user charges and costs of tax collection, enforcement, and wastes management, which are essential to environmental protection. Nevertheless, while providing opportunities the process of urbanisation also generates environmental pressures. A nation that is unable to utilise the opportunities and alleviate the pressures through integrated environmental, economic and physical planning finds that mismanaged urbanisation can pose enormous environmental and economic problems that become increasingly difficult to solve with time. Unfortunately, Pakistan is one of the countries which have not managed the process of urbanisation effectively. This paper, after tracing the urbanisation trends in Pakistan, discusses the existing and emerging environmental impacts and risks. The country is at the stage of risk transition where modern risks caused by industrial and traffic pollution, such as chemicals, heavy metals and noise, combine with the traditional risks such as bacteriological and parasitic infections caused by inadequate infrastructure facilities particularly water supply and sanitation. The paper also analyses the responses to urban environmental problems in terms of approaches to sustainable urban development. Finally, it outlines the holistic policy directions to environmentally sound and sustainable urban development, including institutional, regulatory, economic and participatory measures.

Bubble Rise Phenomena Through Newtonian & Non-Newtonian Fluids

The characteristics of bubble rise phenomenon in three liquids were investigated and are reported here. The experimental rig consists of two transparent cylindrical columns – one a polycarbonate tube of 125 mm diameter and the other an acrylic tube of 400 mm diameter. The rig also consists of a lifting device designed to hold a video camera for taking bubble images. Water and two non-Newtonian fluids (0.025% and 0.045% by weight of polyacrylamide solutions) were used in this study. The smaller polycarbonate tube was used to study the velocity and the drag coefficient under vacuum. The bigger acrylic tube was used to study the influence of the size of bubbles

Measuring Sustainability - UK wealth accounts for 25 years

What is sustainability and how do we measure it? Sustainability could be achieved through sustainable development and much of the literature on sustainable development has taken human well-being to be the object to be sustained. By constructing a very large and extensive National Accounts consistent database, this study develops an original set of UK wealth accounts for 25 years – 1988 to 2012 – to measure UK sustainability. While doing so, this research calculates the monetary value of UK natural capital and human capital which is then added into produced capital to develop a first comprehensive wealth account for the UK. This thesis argues that both wealth accounting approaches - "top-down" and "bottom-up" - are conceptually the same. They only differ empirically because of the methodologies employed to calculate natural capital, human capital and total wealth. This thesis shows how these both approaches can be combined together to measure UK sustainability. This study concludes that since 2007 UK is not on a sustainable path. Despite a positive genuine savings, since 2007 UK wealth has a negative growth rate and wealth per capita is in decline. A positive genuine savings with a fall in wealth per capita shows that UK savings has not been sufficient to compensate for a fall in wealth and population growth. In order to reverse the trend, either UK has to reduce its population growth or it needs to reinvest in its capital asset bases. This thesis argues that an increase in population does not always decrease per capita wealth because an increase in population driven by a skilled work force increases the value of human capital and thus total wealth. This increase in wealth could offset an increase in population keeping per capita wealth intact. Furthermore, for UK, which is not a resource rich country, investment in human capital is needed to increase the rate of wealth growth

EFFECT ON FLEXIBILITY OF VOLLEYBALL PLAYERS BY SOME SELECTED EXERCISES

The aim of the study was to determine the effect on flexibility of volleyball players by some selected exercises. For this purpose 20 male volley ball players (10 for control group and 10 for experimental group) of Government Boys Higher secondary school Charirshareef Budgam were selected randomly as subject and the age was ranging from 17 to 21 years. Exercises were restricted to Trunk twisting, Rope skipping, Shoulder and chest stretch, Alternative toe touch zigzag Running, Hip stretch and Hamstring stretch. Flexibility was restricted to Trunk and Shoulder flexibility. The data were collected before the start of 8 weeks selected exercise programme (pre test) and immediately after the completion of 8 weeks selected exercise programme (post test) by sit and reach test for the trunk flexibility and shoulder elevation test by using yard stick and ruler and score was recorded in centimeters. To determine the training effect on flexibility Independent and Dependent t-test statistical technique were employed. The level of significance was set at 0.05 to check the significant mean difference. The finding of statistical analysis revealed that there were significant difference between the mean of pre and post test of experimental group and post test of control and experiment group. Experimental group significantly improved the selected flexibility because of systematic training programme.  Article visualizations

Problems and Prospects of Urban Environmental Management in Pakistan

Discussions on environmental conditions often assume that urbanisation contributes to the degradation of the environment. However, urbanisation per se is not detrimental to the environment. Concentrations of population and economic activities through urbanisation offer opportunities in providing environmental infrastructure and health services costeffectively, because of economies of scale. It also provides opportunities to effectively internalise environmental costs; because concentration of economic activities reduces user charges and costs of tax collection, enforcement, and wastes management, which are essential to environmental protection. Nevertheless, while providing opportunities the process of urbanisation also generates environmental pressures. A nation that is unable to utilise the opportunities and alleviate the pressures through integrated environmental, economic and physical planning finds that mismanaged urbanisation can pose enormous environmental and economic problems that become increasingly difficult to solve with time. Unfortunately, Pakistan is one of the countries which have not managed the process of urbanisation effectively. This paper, after tracing the urbanisation trends in Pakistan, discusses the existing and emerging environmental impacts and risks. The country is at the stage of risk transition where modern risks caused by industrial and traffic pollution, such as chemicals, heavy metals and noise, combine with the traditional risks such as bacteriological and parasitic infections caused by inadequate infrastructure facilities particularly water supply and sanitation. The paper also analyses the responses to urban environmental problems in terms of approaches to sustainable urban development. Finally, it outlines the holistic policy directions to environmentally sound and sustainable urban development, including institutional, regulatory, economic and participatory measures

Agricultural development in Khyber Pakhtun Khwa, prospects, challenges and Policy options

KHYBER PAKHTUN KHWA is home to citizens, famed and known for their sense of honor, bravery, and hard work. This is evident from their history and their achievements in Pakistani metropolis and abroad. Despite true potential of its dwellers the Frontier Province is one of the poorest in Pakistan. The main income generating sectors of the province being hydro-power, tourism, horticulture, forestry, tobacco, maize marble and gemstone while main hurdles in the way of development are poverty, ignorance, security threats, religiosity and narrow nationalism. In KHYBER PAKHTUN KHWA agriculture is the main source of livelihood for masses. The emerging scenario of globalization demands a type of agriculture that can compete in the global market. The agriculture in the KHYBER PAKHTUN KHWA though diversified and possesses potential but is still under developed. There is a dire need of a thorough study on agriculture of the region to investigate the factors, which cause backwardness of agriculture in the province. To know about the causes of comparatively lagging state of agriculture in KHYBER PAKHTUN KHWA, investigation of various physical, institutional and economic questions about the role of government in disseminating information and knowledge, enabling farmers to accede to physical inputs, removing where ever possible environmental obstacles and improving the structure of incentives will have to be explored on the inter-provincial level. The study will induce the efforts for improving the living standards in the rural areas of the province. As the study is spadework in its nature on agricultural development in the province. It may stimulate the policy makers, practitioners and researchers whose daily concern brings them into direct contact with the problem of lagging agriculture, to do thorough work on agriculture of KHYBER PAKHTUN KHWA in future.   Â