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Big brown cloud threatens Lanka, scientists warn
Agriculture, health and rainfall patterns could be affected; South Asian governments urged to take urgent measures
From Neville de Silva in London
A three-kilometre thick pollution cloud spreading over South Asia is threatening the region's agriculture, health and rainfall patterns and could do serious damage in the future, a group of scientists has warned.

Launching the report on their findings, the scientists working with the United Nations Environmental Programme(UNEP) stressed that the economic gains of the last decade made by the eight countries of this region including Sri Lanka, would soon suffer because of what they called the "Asian Brown Cloud"(ABC).

The report was intended to be an alarm, alerting the political leaders of the region to the imminent danger facing the Asian region from Afghanistan to China and the need to take action to combat the spreading pollution.

"You can think of this as an early warning to governments," said Professor Veerabhadran Ramanathan of the Scripps Institute of Oceanography of the University of California, in an interview with The Sunday Times.

Speaking after the media conference in London held to launch this first report on the subject of the ABC, Prof Ramanathan, one of key scientists in the group, told the Sunday Times: "The first thing is for the region to get together. For example we are finding pollution all the way from East Asia to Sri Lanka. Likewise the Sri Lanka condition can travel elsewhere. The whole region is interconnected and the problem should be dealt with collectively."

UNEP sources from Bangkok told The Sunday Times that some 20 Asian Environment Ministers had already been alerted to the phenomenon and all the 30 or so countries in the region would be notified of the report's findings. Initial findings indicate that the build of the haze, which is brown in colour and visible, is a mass of ash, acids, aerosols and other particles, is creating havoc with weather systems such as rainfall and wind patterns and causing droughts in western parts of Asia.

"The haze is a result of forest fires, the burning of agricultural wastes, dramatic increases in the burning of fossil fuels in vehicles, industries and power stations and emissions from millions of inefficient cookers burning wood, cow dung and other bio fuels," Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of UNEP told the media.

"There are also global implications not least because a pollution parcel like this, which stretches three kilometres high, can travel half way round the globe in a week," he said underlining that the ABC was not only a threat to Asia but could have an impact well outside the continent.

The findings on the ABC came from observations and data gathered by 200 scientists working on the Indian Ocean Experiment (INDOEX) since 1995, helped by new satellite readings and computer modelling.

The researchers have examined broadly the impact of the haze on the region's climate, rainfall, health and agriculture. It is also trying to ascertain whether there is any connection between the haze and global warming.

Asked whether there have been any signs that the ABC has had an effect on agriculture etc, Prof Ramanathan said: "This is what we are trying to study. The atmosphere has no boundaries. In fact the haze is going even beyond China".

Asked whether the current phenomenon could affect the oceans and marine life, not to mention the mineral resources in the seabed, he said "We have not even touched on this".

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