The Central Environment Authority (CEA) and its sub agencies are constantly under scrutiny, judged and subject to heated debate over a multitude of environmental issues by the Sri Lankan public. With President Maithripala Sirisena himself at the helm of Environment Protection, the CEA is considered the key authority responsible for the herculean task of keeping the Sri Lanka’s environment clean.
What is the CEA’ s chief role? Is it vested with the required legal and administrative muscle to be the watchdog of protecting Sri Lanka’s nature and the environment?
BMD spoke to CEA’s Director General, Mr. Hemantha Jayasinghe who has taken a lead in the digitalizing processes in the Authority and introducing new ERP base system approach to smarter authority functions including HR system etc.
Q: With the global focus on the environment and its multi-faceted issues, the CEA in Colombo is very much in the hot seat dealing with a series of environment issues. Currently what is your key focus?
Pollution control is top priority for us right now. Pollution is measured under several parameters; vehicle emissions, air quality, industrial waste, noise pollution, etc. with specific laws to regulate each of these areas under the provisions of the National Environment Act.
The Environmental Pollution Control Division is one of the three main divisions of the CEA. The main responsibility of the division is prevention and controling of environmental pollution issues.
Read BMD August 2019 for more details…