Emissions by automobiles put an adverse impact on most of crops and plants, leading to a potential health hazards for mankind, said Dhaka University’s soil, water and environment professor SM Imamul Huq at a daylong seminar on Saturday. He said the pollutants of air from the automobiles including carbon monoxide (CO), lead (Pb), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone (O3), particulate matter (PM), and sulfur dioxide (SO2) cause contamination of roadside soil and waters, affecting the nutritional status and quality of plants and crops.
He was presenting a keynote paper at the seminar on ‘Air quality and its consequences: Bangladesh perspective’ at Dhaka University’s old senate building.
The Centre for Advanced Research in Sciences organised the seminar in cooperation with Germany’s Wuppertal University and Higher Education Quality Enhancement Project of University Grants Commission.
‘Most of our agricultural lands are by the side of highways,’ Imamul said, ‘There is, thus, every possibility that our lands are contaminated directly by the automobile emissions such as CO, Hydrocarbons, NOx Peroxyacetylnitrate, SO2 , particulate Zn and Pb.’
Conducting his survey covering 32 kilometers of Dhaka-Chittagong highway from Shanir Akhra to north end of Meghna bridge and also peri-urban areas of Dhaka city —Narsinghdi near Dhaka-Sylhet highway and an interior site in Dhamrai near Dhaka-Aricha highway, Imamul reached his conclusion.
Among the crops he tested during his survey included edible crops and vegetables like rice, bean, brinjal, and other local grains etc.
He said, ‘Emitted heavy metals ultimately deposit on soil and plant surfaces and taken up by the plants.’
He also said people living near highways tend to grow vegetables in the depressions, basins and lands along the highways that contaminate these vegetables and harm the consumers through food chain.
DU vice-chancellor AAMS Arefin Siddique inaugurated the seminar as chief guest while pro-VC (administration) Shahid Akhtar Hossain, also sub-project manager, chaired the function.
UGC member M Muhibur Rahman and alternate sub-project manager Zakia Parveen, among others, spoke.
A total of fifty teachers and researchers of various universities participated in the seminar.
-With New Age input
