Skopje, 26 September 2024 (MIA) — State environmental inspectors will start conducting thorough on-site inspections to investigate sources of air pollution, especially in the fall and winter, First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Environment and Physical Planning Izet Mexhiti and State Environmental Inspectorate director Ivana Ginovska told a news conference Thursday.

The inspections will start with the largest industrial production plants in the Skopje region. Teams from the State Environmental Inspectorate will conduct on-site inspections and check the compliance of the plants' operations in practice with the conditions in their Integrated Environmental Permits. 

The government's goal, Mexhiti said, was to take timely steps to reduce air pollution.

"Our strategic resolve is to tackle the sources of pollution," the environment minister said. "Considering that the air quality [problem] cannot be solved overnight, and that is not a local problem or a problem for a single ministry, our activities to reduce air pollution will aim to be inclusive, shared and coordinated with all relevant institutions."

Ginovska said the first to be inspected over the fall and winter months would be factories with A-Integrated Environmental Permits.

She said environmental inspectors would be joined by Ministry of Environment staff that issue the permits. She added that any problems identified by state inspectors would be publicly disclosed.

The State Environmental Inspectorate would also develop a six-year strategy for implementing laws and optimizing resources region by region, the SEI head said.

To strengthen the inspectors' integrity and have them conduct better inspections, the SEI teams would be made up not of local inspectors but of inspectors coming from different cities, Ginovska stressed.

The SEI director also said there was staffing shortage at the inspectorate, so it would soon employ three new environmental inspectors. Depending on the national budget, she added, the SEI could create nine more jobs next year. mr/