Financial Times

Environmentalist finds fault in Environmental Institute
A top environmentalist has protested against the creation of a Sri Lanka Environmental Institute saying it is an anti-environmental act that will discourage thousands of people who seek to protect the environment via their own initiatives.

Hemantha Withanage, Executive Director/Environmental Scientist, at the Centre for Environmental Justice (CEJ), said in an open letter that several other environmentalists had protested the issue at a recent meeting.
According to the note distributed by the Central Environment Authority (CEA), the objective of establishing the institute is “to uphold the dignity and raise the reputation of the environmental profession in Sri Lanka, and to expand the profession and its services to the country at large and extend its usefulness to the advantage of the public”.

To be a member, a person should have had seven years practice in an environmental field. Membership will also be issued to those who have a post-graduate degree or hold a degree of not less four academic years duration in an environmentalist subject for a period of not less than four years after obtaining such a first degree. If that person has a degree in any other field, then the seven years of experience is called upon.

“Perhaps CEA is referring to an environmental scientist and not environmentalist. Probably the intention of the CEA is to establish an ‘Institute of Environmental Science or Environmental Professionals’ which is more acceptable,” said Mr Withanage, who is currently based in Manila as the executive director of the NGO Forum on the ADB, in the letter sent to President Mahinda Rajapaksa and many others.

According to the American Heritage dictionary, an “environmentalist” is a person who seeks to protect the natural environment, as from air and water pollution, wasteful use of resources, an excessive human encroachment; or a person who believes that the environment is more important than heredity in influencing intellectual growth and cultural development”.

“Perhaps giving a definition to the term ‘environmentalist’ is wrong and makes unnecessary boundaries. However, in my opinion an ‘environmentalist’ is a person who has an environmental consciousness and who seek and is involved in the protection of the environment and is vigilant on environmental issues.
In my experience this environmentalist can be found in every layer of society: among farmers, teachers, priests, elders, doctors, lawyers, students, politicians, journalists, women and other professionals,” he said.

Although most visible environmentalists are attached to environmental organisations, professional government and non-government bodies, they are not the only environmentalists to be found in the country. “According to my experience, the best environmentalists are those among non-professionals who do not have any written qualifications, especially not those put forward by the CEA note. Environmental journalists and environmental lawyers who play a very important ‘environmentalist’ role will be totally disrespected under this establishment.

“With reluctance I have to mention that according to the CEA interpretation, an uneducated Seattle-based, but environmental conscious, red Indian chief would not be classified as an ‘environmentalist’,” the letter said.
He urged the CEA to abandon this anti-environmental act.

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