Qatar to have West Asia's first Ozone layer monitoring centre

NEW YORK: The West Asia's first centre to monitor the health of Ozone layer, which protects the environment from the harmful ultraviolet rays coming from the sun, is to come up in Qatar.

The high-tech centre to be set up under a UN backed project will fill the ground and satellite-data gaps in West Asia to help monitor the Ozone layer which actually recovering after decades of depletion due to environment abuse by the human being.

Under the UN Environment Programme, over 90% of Ozone damaging gases have already been phased out and it is predicted that the layer might fully recover around the year 2060.

But without direct scientific observations worldwide, governments cannot know whether improvements are genuinely taking place or whether there is a need to step up or re-focus the response, UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner said.

"Big data gaps exist for a range of key issues, from climate and ozone to particles and aerosols in the air and atmosphere, in several regions. These include Siberia and large parts of Africa, including the Congo River Basin," said Steiner.

The Qatar station will help in finding data relating to West Asia and the Gulf to benefit the region and the world, he added.