Transboundary problems need transboundary solutions: Defra’s Air Quality Minister on borderless policy

MP Trudy Harrison, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, explains the aims of a new multinational air quality forum. 

Air Quality News prides itself on independent journalism but is also committed to shining a light on the latest ideas, policies and initiatives impacting this rapidly evolving space.

With this in mind, and with fast-moving changes at governmental level, we thought it prudent to offer the UK’s new Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, some editorial room to breathe and outline recent developments effecting the atmosphere.

This comes at a time when our understanding of how to tackle air pollution is going through a long-overdue paradigm shift. No longer a static issue, or solo problem with responsibility shouldered by individual regions or nations, much like the wider climate crisis itself, there is growing acknowledgement that air quality is a global issue and can only be tackled through well-conceived multilateral solutions that cross boundaries.

Fittingly, this was the core message of 2022’s International Day of Clean Air and forms the fundamental raison d’etre for a new task force that met for the first-time mid-October to discuss how to turn that ideology into action.

MP Trudy Harrison, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, was present and correct for this meeting of minds, hence our invitation for her to pen an op-ed for the latest issue of our magazine, summarising  the group’s aims, and reiterating the fact air quality and air pollution are transboundary issues. The point being, we cannot hope to successfully tackle such problems at a local or even national level.

Dive into the full feature below.