Lucknow: While climate change and air pollution hardly come to the issue that dominated the elections in India, a recent survey conducted in major cities of Uttar Pradesh revealed that people wanted to environment related issues raised in the polls.
Of the 1,215 respondents, half of them women, in six cities – Meerut, Agra, Lucknow, Kanpur, Gorakhpur and Varanasi – 76 percent said they want the political parties to address air pollution at the next election because it affects their health.
In a survey conducted by the climate trends and YouGov, 87 percent of respondents said that climate change “is important or very important” in determining their choice.
More than 80 percent said they were “aware of” the impact of air pollution on climate change and its impact on the economy.
Climate trends are and the Environmental Advocacy Group is a market research firm YouGov.
Surveyors asked some questions about air pollution and whether it can affect their vote.
Nearly half (47 percent) indicate that the air quality in their cities are not good.
In addition, 73 percent of vehicle exhaust connecting the main reason for poor air quality, and 65 percent say it is the construction and road dust.
When people asked about the government’s actions to be taken to combat air pollution, 64 percent say the answer is to plant more trees while 60 percent said that building the infrastructure and providing subsidies to encourage people to buy electric vehicles is the solution.
Welcoming the survey, Venkatesh Dutta, Professor in the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Bhimrao Ambedkar Babasaheb, said, “The findings were positive because they show that the general public with regard to the basic problems of air quality is good.
The latest statistics show that poor air quality leads to the average loss of life for 10 years.
the political leadership must act aggressively and quickly to reduce the impact on health.
“