Punjab Chief Minister Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif has sought a regional cooperation agreement to tackle the issue of smog and environment pollution. Shahbaz has written a letter to his Indian counterpart and invited him to enter a regional cooperation agreement on the issue of smog. "The people of both Pakistani and Indian Punjab have been facing the problem of smog during the months of October and November," he said, adding: "It goes without saying that the smog has an adverse impact on health, especially on the old and the children; on agriculture in the form of delayed sowing of wheat and damage to potato and other crops and causes traffic accidents."
Shahbaz in the letter explained that the problem of smog now affects Lahore, New Delhi and regions beyond the two cities. Shahbaz also said in the letter that it is in the interest of people of both the Punjabs that a collective effort should be made towards identifying technologies and business methods that may eliminate the need to burn rice-stubble and help control smog formation.