NEW DELHI: Pollution levels in New Delhi have hit their worst this year in the past two days — earning a “severe” to “emergency” rating and indicating conditions that can spark a public health crisis.
Christmas Day in the Indian capital is also forecast to be bleak.
Senior government officials said the main reasons for the surge in the amount of toxic smog trapped over New Delhi were unusually cold air, including fog, and a lack of wind.
This mean that vehicle fumes, pollution from coal-fired power plants and industries, as well as smoke from fires being burned to keep people warm hangs over the city.
Data from the government’s Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) showed the air quality index, which measures the concentration of poisonous particulate matter, was an average of 449 on Monday, only slightly better than the 450 on Sunday.
The index measures the concentration of tiny poisonous particulate matter, or PM 2.5, that are less than 2.5 microns in diameter, which can be carried deep into the lungs.
The previous highest recording this year was 447 on June 15, when there was a dust storm.
Anything above 100 is considered unhealthy.
In some parts of Delhi, pollution levels hit 654 on Monday, among the worst recorded this year, and visibility in some parts of the city was just 200 meters, the weather department said.
Environmentalists said that inaction by the authorities was inexcusable and a concerted effort was needed to reduce pollution from vehicles and industry.
“If this is not an emergency, then what is?” asked Delhi-based environmentalist Vimlendu Jha.
The “severe” to “emergency” ratings mean that the air is not only hazardous for citizens with existing respiratory problems but can also seriously affect healthy people.
Conditions are likely to remain severe on Tuesday, a holiday for Christmas. The PM 2.5 level may average above 400 and hit a high of 534 in some places, CPCB data showed.
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CPCB announced measures such as shutting factories and construction sites in heavily polluted areas until Wednesday along with an advisory to avoid using diesel-powered vehicles. (https://bit.ly/2EKre9J)
“The situation might improve slightly but is likely to continue in severe category until afternoon of Dec. 26, when wind speeds will pick up and improve dispersion of pollutants,” said a task force headed by the CPCB.
Steps this year have failed to make much difference and instead there has been finger-pointing between Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration, the city government and the governments of states around the capital.
The apparent lack of concern about the toxic air among ordinary folk gives federal and local politicians the cover they need for failing to address the problem, say pollution activists and social scientists.
During October and November, the federal government had blamed neighboring states for failing to curb the burning of stubble in fields, but Delhi’s air worsened in December, data showed.
India’s toxic air claimed 1.24 million lives in 2017, or 12.5 percent of total deaths, according to a study published in Lancet Planetary Health this month.
“We are definitely seeing an increase in the number of patients with respiratory problems,” said Doctor Desh Deepak, at the government-run Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital.
A damning report by the World Health Organization this year said India was home to the world’s 14 most polluted cities, with Delhi the sixth worst.
For a second year, New Delhi’s chief minister has likened the city to a “gas chamber.”
A city government spokesman was not immediately available for comment.
India’s capital chokes as pollution levels hit the worst this year
India’s capital chokes as pollution levels hit the worst this year
- Environmentalists said that inaction by the authorities was inexcusable
- The “severe” to “emergency” ratings mean that the air is not only hazardous for citizens with existing respiratory problems but can also seriously affect healthy people
Carney says Canada has no plans to pursue free trade agreement with China as Trump threatens tariffs
Carney says Canada has no plans to pursue free trade agreement with China as Trump threatens tariffs
TORONTO: Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Sunday his country has no intention of pursuing a free trade deal with China. He was responding to US President Donald Trump’s threat to impose a 100 percent tariff on goods imported from Canada if America’s northern neighbor went ahead with a trade deal with Beijing.
Carney said his recent agreement with China merely cuts tariffs on a few sectors that were recently hit with tariffs.
Trump claims otherwise, posting that “China is successfully and completely taking over the once Great Country of Canada. So sad to see it happen. I only hope they leave Ice Hockey alone! President DJT”
The prime minister said under the free trade agreement with the US and Mexico there are commitments not to pursue free trade agreements with nonmarket economies without prior notification.
“We have no intention of doing that with China or any other nonmarket economy,” Carney said. “What we have done with China is to rectify some issues that developed in the last couple of years.”
In 2024, Canada mirrored the United States by putting a 100 percent tariff on electric vehicles from Beijing and a 25 percent tariff on steel and aluminum. China had responded by imposing 100 percent import taxes on Canadian canola oil and meal and 25 percent on pork and seafood.
Breaking with the United States this month during a visit to China, Carney cut its 100 percent tariff on Chinese electric cars in return for lower tariffs on those Canadian products.
Carney has said there would be an initial annual cap of 49,000 vehicles on Chinese EV exports coming into Canada at a tariff rate of 6.1 percent, growing to about 70,000 over five years. He noted there was no cap before 2024. He also has said the initial cap on Chinese EV imports was about 3 percent of the 1.8 million vehicles sold in Canada annually and that, in exchange, China is expected to begin investing in the Canadian auto industry within three years.
Trump posted a video Sunday in which the chief executive of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association warns there will be no Canadian auto industry without US access, while noting the Canadian market alone is too small to justify large scale manufacturing from China.
“A MUST WATCH. Canada is systematically destroying itself. The China deal is a disaster for them. Will go down as one of the worst deals, of any kind, in history. All their businesses are moving to the USA. I want to see Canada SURVIVE AND THRIVE! President DJT,” Trump posted on social media.
Trump’s post on Saturday said that if Carney “thinks he is going to make Canada a ‘Drop Off Port’ for China to send goods and products into the United States, he is sorely mistaken.”
“We can’t let Canada become an opening that the Chinese pour their cheap goods into the U.S,” US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on ABC’s “This Week.”
“We have a , but based off — based on that, which is going to be renegotiated this summer, and I’m not sure what Prime Minister Carney is doing here, other than trying to virtue-signal to his globalist friends at Davos.”
Trump’s threat came amid an escalating war of words with Carney as the Republican president’s push to acquire Greenland strained the NATO alliance.
Carney has emerged as a leader of a movement for countries to find ways to link up and counter the US under Trump. Speaking in Davos before Trump, Carney said, “Middle powers must act together because if you are not at the table, you are on the menu” and he warned about coercion by great powers — without mentioning Trump’s name. The prime minister received widespread praise and attention for his remarks, upstaging Trump at the World Economic Forum.
Trump’s push to acquire Greenland has come after he has repeatedly needled Canada over its sovereignty and suggested it also be absorbed into the United States as a 51st state. He posted an altered image on social media this week showing a map of the United States that included Canada, Venezuela, Greenland and Cuba as part of its territory.
