Chemical Education Journal (CEJ), Vol. 5, No. 1 /Registration
No. 5-17/Received January 24, 2001.
URL = http://www.juen.ac.jp/scien/cssj/cejrnlE.html
ZOLNAI Albert and CZEKUS Geza
The University of Novi Sad, Department of Teacher Education in Sombor
E-mail: czekusg@yunord.net
"When you have cut down the tree,
poisoned the last river,
caught the last fish,
ONLY THEN will you understand that you
cannot eat money"
(An Indian chieftain)
The rapid development of the entire industry, but especially of the chemical industry and its processing industry, can be attributed to the professional knowledge of the 20th century man.
During this century, production in the world has grown fifty times its starting rate and the exploitation of power-supplying resources thirty times. Nobody has paid attention to the chemical and other industrial pollution and thus crucial changes have occured in the Earth's atmosphere and the entire biosphere. In the global sense, an "insignificant" human race has endangered the necessary biological balance required for the plants and animal world of our planet. By doing this, human race has become an important factor in the changes affecting the Earth.
This is the thue, but let us see where have science and mankind gone wrong?!
Science, thas is to say scientists have made the greatest mistake in teaching production processes, machine elements and giving professional advice from elementary to university level, since they have not emphasized enough the importance of taking good care of all materials, especially natural resources, since they are limited.
As we see it, a disastrous mistake was made when professional education, without any serious doubt, started serving profit-seeking, selfish and dubious social purposes. We were afraid to contradict the economic policy proclaiming the so-called "well-being." This policy was trying (and probably still is) to gain quick profit from the invested money for the sake of alleged social purposes, paying no attention to the environment. Unfortunately, this society has continuously and consciously, probably even deliberately, destroyed and degraded the environment by this harming the property and living conditions of its citizens.
In a system of production where machines and equipment are used over their full capacity, workers grow exhausted and wearily sustain technological processes. This has led to series of on-the-job accidents, even catastrophe. Of course, factory managers have not disclosed anything, for the sake of so-called production objectives. Only international, global catastrophies like Bopal, Chernobil, a mine catastrophe or the breaking down of the hydropower plant's lock have become known. The uncontrolled and often primitive ways of discarding industrial, colliery and urban garbage proves that even experts and science itself have turned into loyal members of the consumer society. It is hard to accept the just criticism that education and science have greately helped many unwelcome processes in this passing century. Science has made it possible that inventions are used for military purposes, against humans and for destruction. It has also allowed turning natural materials into loads of garbage and dangerous substances in a very short time.
The economy of a country requires experts which are educated in appropriate secondary schools, colleges and different faculties. Let us see under which conditions? Very often, due to the urgent need for experts, the curriculum contains more theoretical that practical classes and the institution's equipment is poor. Engineers as teachers of professional subjects are often out of touch with the real production situation in factories, so the knowledge students receive cannot be applied in production. This is the reason why university-trained people cannot immediately join the production programmes of a factory, and spend years as trainees.
Most of the workers are unskilled, sometimes even without the basic formal education. This represents the core of the problem. It is a futile effort to find among these workers those who pay attention to their work, show high moral standards and come up with improvements. In most of the factories, thousands of illiterate people who resent everything new and fear innovation, try to earn their living by filling the quota of production.
Politicians do not like experts with modern views. They prefer over-obliging, sycophant managers, who are willing, by using dubious plans, to produce more and earn greater profit, thereby polluting plough-lands, rivers, seas. People like these allow politics to dictate the rhythm of production. In this way, science and experts have, willingly or unwillingly, contributed to creating great problems worlwide, problems which slowly but certainly ruin those properties and values without which the Earth' biosphere cannot survive.
Since we are not in favour of theorizing, instead of further criticism, we shall present the efforts made in our town.
Subotica is one of Vojvodina's bigger towns. It used to have a relatively developed educational system and industry. Agriculture and the production facilities connected with it was the most developed. Equally important was the chemical industry: the production of sulphuric acid, pesticides and fertilizers. The factory of electric motors and irrigation systems used to be famous as well.
The chemical industry and especially the fertilizer factory represent a great problem for the town and its inhabitants. The old factory, built in 1904, has expanded because of its open production system and is still working, while the new fertilizer factory, when opened, had the kind of equipment and technology banned in western countries! The problematic issues can be listed under the following categories:
the chemical factories
We made an energetic protest, using the city' media, trying to stop this vandal act but not with much success. The evil acts of the stubborn and determined factory managment could not be stopped, because they had the support of the stupid and quasi-human politiens of that time. No wonder that this happened, since the local government and politicians of that period were all recruited from this factory. Since large-scale demonstrations were organized, the factory managment decided to stop any further dumping of the silt and clear up the wasteland and the area around it. A 50 cm thick layer of sand was spread over the silt and 17 water-wels were drilled, at the depth of 60 m, to control the quality of water. The water-wells of the houses 100 m away from the wasteland, which were at 8-10 m depth, were all burried and new ones were drilled, at the depth of 60 m.
The quality of water was regulary controlled between 1984 and 1993, with the help of the city's waterworks. Yet, neither the politicians, nor the factory managment informed the general public about the results of those analyse. No wonder, since the results were unbelievably bad (see the results). We as independent experts and environ mentalists could not pass information, since the factory issued a statement, saying that the silt will improve the quality of the soil (sand) and thus make the 56 hectares large area suitable for growing crops.
The city government, retroactively and without any investigation, gave a temporary permission for dumping the silt.
After 18 years, the silt turned into a surface resembling rocky surfaces of unknown planets, when it is rainy, but in winter as well, water dissolves the toxic matter, ions, harmful amalgams (see the results of the soil analyses).
These collections of photos, videos prove that economists, engineers working in the chemical industry "Zorka", just as well as the politicians and experts from that factory, knew very well that silence is golden and that time was on their side. The analyses showed the harm their act will cause to their fellow citizens, their children, their lives. Still, they hid their professional and social reputation and ethics behind the "greater profit" phylosophy, thus endangering the lives and health of others and failing both morally and professionally.
The waste land is situated north of Subotica, in the so-called Deszkas-forest. This territory is some 2 km away from the meeting point of sand and "losz" of the Subotica-Horgos sandy land (Czekus, 1976). It is adjacent to vineyards and weekend cottages on the one hand, and on the other, there are 100 hectars of Celtis occidentalis L. forest and a sandy meadow. Since the wasteland is very close to a populated area, it is under strong antropogeneous effects. The forest is the most homogeneous but at the same time, it has the least original flora. It should be noted that the area is used as a pasture, as well!
An association of Festucetum vaginateae has developed on this originally sandy land (Sturc, 1973, Cekus 1997). As Kaan Karoly (1931) said: "when people excessively change the surface of the land, irreplaceable values are annihilated". Among the typical species of the association Alkanna tinctoria L, Tausch, Gypsophila fistigiata L, ssp. Arenaria W.et K, Tragopogon floccocus W.et K., Dianthus serotinus W.et K , Stipa sabulosa Paczoki, Sljusarenko, Epipactis atrorubens Hoffm., Schult. ssp. Borbas, Soo., - only some can be rarely found. Among the trees Populus alba L. and Pinus nigra L. can be found. This originally intact was naturally planted by the neighbouring plant species. Since the area is under human influence, mainly weed can be found. Different kinds of grasses are very common, just as well as the Fabaceae - species. Among the 98 species of 29 plants families, the most numerous are the Asteracea, Poaceae, Fabaceae, Scrophullariaceae and the Boraginaceae (diagram 5.). This heterogeneousness is indicated by the fact that 13 plant families are represented by only one species each.
The characteristics of the early spring's aspect are Taraxacum officinale Weber, Carex hudsonii Bennett, Muscari racemosum L., Myosotis palustris L., Alyssum ayssoides L., Lamium purpureum L., Viola arvensis L, followed by Capsella bursa-pastroris L., Anchusa officinalis L., Lepidium draba L., Trifolium repens L., Festuca pseudovina Hackel ap. Wiesb., Chenopodium album L, Hordeum murinum L., Arctium lappa L., Artemisia vulgaris L., etc. After these, there are no new species, because of the summer drought.
It should be mentioned that 10 species of woody-stalked plants were noticed. They are the following: Pinus nigra L., Elaeagnus angustifolia L. Rosa canina L., Crataegus monogyna L., Populus alba L., Salix rosmarinifolia L., Lycium barbarum L., Tamarix ramosisssima Ledeb, Celtis occidentalis L., and Ulmus laevis Pall. Among these, the autochtonous on the Subotica sandy land are Crataegus monogyna L. and Populus alba L. (Gajic, 1986). A single of the Asparagus officinalis L. has developed here as well, although it is a protected plant in Vojvodina.
The experimental beans, planted in the intact soil from the waste-land, has spronted and grown, just as the control one in the garden soil. The beans planted in the soil from the wasteland spronted a few days earlier than the control one. When it was 10 days old, it was on an average 13 cm, while the control one was only 5 cm. At the end of the third week, the control plant managed to catch up with the experimental plant; afterwards their development was more or less uniform.
Improvement and protection of the environment depend greatly from individuals, especially from experts and their moral behaviour. Even this large quantity of polluting material could be dealt with using international experience and solutions, without much cost. It only requires professional ethics and cooperation and problems can be solved, for the benefit of our children's health.
During our research, we have highlighted the mistake of experts, their futile work, lack of moral standards and moral behaviour. With our analyses, we have recorded a great danger. According to the analyses, we could with good reason, demand from the management of the factories, as well as the engineers, owners and political officials, to keep their promise from 4 February, 1983. Namely, to use the 176906 tons of dry sediment for making fertilizers. According to them, after only 5 years, the silt could be used in making fertilizers. What is more, the hills of plaster could be used to make building material, since it does not contain harmful radioactive matter. We have conducted research using Geiger-Muller measurer, which did not show radioactive radiation. Since times more time has passed from the chemical industry's promise, it would be great if the 56 hectares large territory was planted with locust or fir-trees, instead of the weed. Those trees would be the lungs of the city and, at the same time, a protection from sand storms.
We hope that the political and economic situation in our country will improve one day, and that governments will be able to organize honest, demanding and above all, safe production. We also hope that not only individuals, but multitudes will demand the protection of the environment.
References
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CEJ Vol. 5, No. 1, Contents