Sarhad Provincial Conservation Strategy - IUCN

6 . 5
L AW REFORM
The NWFP has a patchwork of laws that affect the
environment, mostly related to natural resources management.
Some of the more important laws are listed
in Box 6.2. Many of these are out-of-date (such as on
forests) and there are significant gaps (comprehensive
water management, for example). No unifying
environmental statute exists, although the province
and the private sector are expected to adhere to environmental
protection standards recently promulgated
under the Environmental Protection Ordinance,
1983. The environment is a concurrent jurisdiction
between Federal and provincial governments, and
while the Federal law is being updated, progress has
been very slow. However, the new draft Federal
Pakistan Environmental Protection Act remains primarily
a narrow pollution-control statute, with some EIA
provisions. The province has determined that it needs
a comprehensive environmental management statute
that contains much more than the conventional ‘command
and control’ regulatory tools.
To develop a modern, comprehensive environmental
law, the province has opted for an open participatory
approach, starting with a discussion of the basic
PRINCIPAL LAWS RELATED BOX
TO THE ENVIRONMENT IN
THE NWFP 1
The Canal and Drainage Act (1873)
The Fisheries Act (1897)
The Sale of Timber Act (1913)
The Forests Act (1927)
The NWFP Hazara Forest Act (1936)
The Factories Act (1934)
The Antiquities Act (1975)
6.2
The NWFP Wildlife (Protection, Preservation,
Conservation & Management) Act (1975)
The Local Government Ordinance (1979)
The Pakistan Environmental Protection Ordinance (1983)
The NWFP Salinity Control & Reclamation of Land Act
(1988)
1 There are 24 additional statutes with some relevance to the environment which are listed
in Appendix 17 of the Environmental Profile.
G O V E R N A N C E & C A P A C I T Y D E V E L O P M E N T 6
content of the legislation. To date, one policy workshop
has taken place at which broad consensus was
reached on several points, including the basic need for
the law and the fact that it would become the core
statute, leading to the reform of other natural resources
legislation. The detailed results of the first consultative
workshop are available in a separate report.
Several innovative sections would be included in
the new law. Key among these would be a fundamental
requirement that Government hold a public
trust and be required to protect the environment. If it
did not uphold this trust, then citizens could take legal
action to enforce the law. This type of provision will
be at the centre of a citizens’ environmental bill of
rights, which would also include protection for
employees, access to information, guarantees of public
participation, and other provisions.
Related to such provisions would be enabling clauses
for partnership agreements with the private sector
and NGOs, to proactively solve environmental problems.
These would be skeletal sections designed to
allow for a variety of positive incentive programmes,
award programmes, innovative funding programmes,
environmental code of practices, and environmental
research initiatives, and generally to provide flexibility
for approaches to environmental management.
The new legislation should also provide a legal
basis for important environmental management
processes that would contribute to proactive environmental
protection. A land use planning process or a
mechanism for integrated resource management will
be useful, as will be the basic tenants of an EIA
process. The details of these processes would be
fleshed out in the regulations of the statute, to allow
for flexibility in the event that changes are needed.
Nevertheless, basic legal cover for the processes is
important if they are to be effective.
Sectoral portions can be included in the Act if they
are needed. Sectors such as forestry, cultural heritage,
and national parks all need new legislation, and these
reforms could be part of this process. Other sectors
such as water management, environmental health,
and environmental research, where there is presently
no legal cover, should also be included.
Conventional environmental protection provisions
must be included in the statute and should be harmo-
SARHAD PROVINCIAL CONSERVATION STRATEGY 55