ITALIAN politicians charged with the job of safeguarding the future of Venice bowed to public pressure last week. They formally agreed that pollution of the city's lagoon is a more pressing concern than inundation of the city by rising sea levels. The steering committee of the project to protect the city from flooding and to regenerate the local environment now wants more power to restrict and to control the nutrients that flow into the lagoon. It is seeking an amendment to Law 798, the law of 1984 that empowered the committee to solve Venice's problems.
It also wants the Italian government to give it authority to establish a new consortium of public and private enterprises that would be responsible for carrying out the committee's recommendations to curtail pollution. These latest moves are a desperate attempt to make some headway with the project.
Nitrates and phosphates released by agriculture and industry ...
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