There are no funds for a wider network of low-price air pollution measuring stations, which were supposed to be emplaced all across Skopje, the capital of North Macedonia. There are no funds for the preparation of the Green Cadaster, either. With the last rebalancing of the City of Skopje’s budget, that was voted in on Monday, only one proposal by the councilors from the “Green Humane City” was passed – to create a workshop for plastics processing, but two other proposals were rejected.
Green Humane City’s councilor and environmental activist, Gorjan Jovanovski, says that it would have been better if the latest rebalancing of the city budget allocated more funds for environmental projects. He stressed that they have requested more money for the creation of a network of low-price sensors that would help in getting the big picture of the pollution in the city. The idea was rejected and the city authorities agreed to a small addition to the previously granted assets from the budget. Instead of MKD4 million for the setup of a wider network of sensors, only MKD1 million were approved, enough for purchase of 2 or 3 sensors.
“The budget already had MKD700,000 for measuring stations and 1 million was added. This is a very small sum for a city that has extreme air pollution. Even though we wanted to acquire a larger number of low-price sensors, the City of Skopje rejected us with an explanation that there is a regulation how the devices should look like and the standards they have to meet. Because of that reason, according to the current prices on the market, only a few can be purchased with this money,” said Jovanovski.
The only one out of the three proposals that were accepted was the establishing a workshop for processing plastics, which will cost around €50,000. The idea is to decrease the waste in the city, but also to give a chance to a certain group of people from vulnerable categories to be able to earn a living through this type of production. With the budget’s amendment, MKD3.1 million will be spent on the facility and the purchase of the necessary machines for shredding and processing the plastic, as well as moulds.
He is displeased that Skopje still doesn’t have a functional Green Cadaster, even though this tool is essential for the city, where many times we have seen the green area veing systematically destroyed. Jovanovski stressed that the city’s services have neither capacity nor resources to go in the field and maintain the greenery. This is why they asked for financial assets, but the idea was rejected by the councilors.
