Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960213170050.10668A-100000@fox.ksu.ksu.edu> Date: Tue, 13 Feb 1996 17:01:10 -0600 From: kerry miller <mailto:astingsh@KSU.KSU.EDU> Subject: One small step for eastern Europe (fwd) To: Multiple recipients of list DEVEL-L <mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU>
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Date: Tue, 13 Feb 1996 12:22:14 CET
From: Ivelin Roussev (+361-250-3401) <mailto:ivo@fs2.bp.rec.hu>
To: Environmental Issues in Central and Eastern Europe List
<mailto:ENVCEE-L@fs2.bp.rec.hu>
Subject: One small step for eastern Europe
One small step for eastern Europe
By Martin Wright
Eastern Europe is widely seen as an environmental basket case; its
pollution problems vast and hopelessly complex, costing trillions of
dollars to clean up, with little prospect of any return on investment.
It ain't necessarily so. The right combination of political
decisiveness and an eye for economic opportunity long-term, can move
mountains -- even turn them into molehills.
On the Estonian island of Dago sits a (very) concrete case in point.
Dago was a closed military area until 1990, a forward outpost of the
Soviet empire. Its isolation was something of an environmental plus:
Dago and its coastal waters are home to a host of animals and plants
which are rare elsewhere in the Baltic. The whole island, with a
population of just 12,000, has been designated a biosphere reserve.
Until this year, however, there was one major problem. Raw sewage from
the island's main industrial area at Korgessaare poured virtually
untreated straight into the sea. It was killing off the coastal
fisheries which were the lifeblood of the town's canning factory. The
town's Soviet-era plant, installed in the early '80s, had never worked
properly and was now in a state of terminal disrepair.
The cash-strapped local municipality lacked the resources either to
repair or replace it and work such as this was too small-scale to
qualify for World Bank assistance. But it proved to be perfect for an
initiative launched by Stockholm Water Action.
The Swedish capital prides itself on having some of the cleanest urban
water in the world: It is safe to swim or fish from waterfronts in the
heart of town. It's an achievement celebrated in the city's annual
water festival and symposium, run by the Stockholm Water Foundation.
By the end of 1993, the foundation had decided that some of this
achievement should be exported to its former Eastern-bloc neighbors
across the Baltic, and Stockholm Water Action was born.
SWA asked the various Baltic governments to come up with water
treatment problems. Estonia was the swiftest to respond and Dago soon
emerged as the ideal candidate. It had a pressing need and a
relatively simple solution. What happened then is an object lesson in
the triumph of will, turning dreams into reality at unprecedented
speed.
SWA assembled an impressive alliance of companies and experts: from
engineering giants like ITT Flygt and ABB, to accountants, lawyers and
smaller contractors, with Scandiaconsult taking the project leadership
role.
The first site visit to Dago took place in February 1994. By early
May, '95 -- a mere 17 months after the idea was first mooted -- the
plant was up and running.
Next to the wreck of its old Soviet plant, Korgessaare now has a
small, simple but highly effective sewage works, pumping clean water
out to sea and providing dried fertilizer for local farms. The total
cost was roughly $900,000 -- a surprisingly small sum, taking into
account the fact that the plant is treating around 60 percent of the
total wastewater load of the island. It works out at around $50 per
person per year, or about half the average rate. With local industry
reliant on local fish stocks -- already showing signs of recovery --
the investment should repay itself many times over. Clean coastal
waters are also essential to Dago's efforts to promote itself as a
center for eco-tourism.
Dago is intended to be the first of a series of such initiatives. SWA
will help local authorities identify pressing needs, locate sources of
funding (either sponsorship, such as the Nordic Investment Bank),
tackle the technical problems and, last but not least, set up
financial structures with the aim of making each project pay for
itself. Appropriate technology is a guiding principle -- the projects
are designed to be run, repaired and maintained by local workers
using, as far as possible, locally manufactured materials, so avoiding
dependency on costly Western technology.
And maybe start turning a few of those mountains into molehills.
(c) 1996 Martin Wright.