Online Reporter
Obey Musiwa
Herald Reporter
THE Environmental Management Agency (EMA) has adopted state-of-the-art equipment at its national laboratory to strengthen the fight against pollution and provide modern, science-based solutions to Zimbabwe’s environmental challenges.
For years, industries and businesses in Zimbabwe had limited access to credible environmental testing locally, with some having to send water, soil and effluent samples to laboratories outside the country at high cost and with delays in obtaining results.
The EMA’s national laboratory, which has been accredited to the ISO/IEC 17025 international standard since 2012, has helped close this gap by providing internationally recognised testing services locally.
The facility has reduced the cost and turnaround time involved in detecting contamination in the country’s rivers, farmland and industrial effluent.
During a media tour of the facility, journalists were taken through live demonstrations of water, soil, air and plant-material testing.
Speaking during the briefing, EMA Laboratory Manager Ms Sylvia Yomisi said the agency was positioning the facility to become a regional reference laboratory, underpinned by continuous investment in modern equipment and highly trained personnel.
“Our vision as a laboratory is to become a regional environmental reference laboratory by 2030,” she said.
“We have state-of-the-art equipment in the laboratory, and we maintain and service it to make sure the performance is up to expectation.”
She said the laboratory’s core mandate was to produce precise and accurate results within specified turnaround times, given the sensitivity of the incidents it responds to.
“There will be some issues in the environment, accidents, spillages, poisoning, and we need to give back results within the specified turnaround time,” she said.
Ms Yomisi said the laboratory, which falls under EMA’s Environmental Protection Department, was staffed by 19 personnel, among them chemists, microbiologists and technicians, all of whom undergo continuous in-house and external training to remain competent.
“It is important for the laboratory to have staff that are competent. Besides recruiting qualified chemists and microbiologists, there is continuous training for our staff, including the technicians, and we do continuous assessment,” she said.
On the scope of its work, she said the laboratory tests ambient water, wastewater, and industrial, mining, sewage and agricultural effluent from across the country, with 334 sampling points monitored nationwide under EMA’s water-quality programme.
“We have about 60 tests in the chemistry section, 10 tests in microbiology, 17 tests for soil and 10 for air, covering all four matrices air, soil, water and plant material,” said Ms Yomisi.
She said maintaining accreditation required continuous investment in equipment calibration and servicing.
She added that a consultant from South Africa had recently been engaged to service some of the laboratory’s specialised instruments.
Beyond its regulatory function, Ms Yomisi said the laboratory also offered commercial testing services to farmers, NGOs, local authorities, industry and other Government departments, and was working towards decentralising services closer to clients countrywide.
She, however, said the laboratory faced challenges in procuring equipment and consumables, most of which are imported, as well as funding constraints that limit how far its testing capabilities can expand.
“In Zimbabwe, we don’t produce a lot of these things, even the equipment, so there are always challenges in procuring them from outside the country,” she said.
