Life is a multi-structured thing. While events in Libya and the divorce legislation issue hog most space in our minds and media at the moment, other matters have their own claim for attention. The Malta Environment and Planning Authority is among the leaders. The environment and planning authority is always in the news, for some reason or another. At the moment it has attracted some controversy because of two high profile appointments.

The authorities have gone outside the box, in more aspects than one, by appointing Petra Bianchi as director for environmental planning, a key division of the authority, and Ian Stafrace as chief executive officer of the authority. Such controversy as has arisen has not been about the singularity of their appointment. Both names have earned respect for themselves in their respective field. Dr Bianchi, an Oxonian, can easily hold her own in intellectual and academic spheres. But she has become most known for her activism for a better environment. Her direct appointment, without a call for applications, attracted some negative reaction. MaltaToday reported yesterday the Mepa auditor has looked into the matter and prepared a report. Its contents remain confidential at the moment but it would be surprising if Dr Bianchi’s appointment was placed under a dark cloud.

She did not need it and will gain nothing from it, except for experience of the innards of the beast work.

There has been little reaction to Dr Stafrace’s move to CEO. That is not surprising. He has been closely associated with Mepa as a partner in the law firm Abela, Stafrace and Associates since the firm’s appointment as legal adviser to the authority 10 years ago. Over that period he must have accumulated vast knowledge of how the authority works. He can bring that knowledge to good purpose in his executive position.

Another personality-factor that followed the revamping of Mepa as part of Parliamentary Secretary Mario de Marco’s remit was the appointment of Giovanni Bonello to the Mepa board. Judge Bonello is one of Malta’s leading personalities and finest brains. He can add value wherever he serves.

How will Mepa move forward after its new dawn? There is more to its task than personalities and worthy appointments. Its refurbishment is expected to bring better policies and more coordination of them. Meanwhile, one major task the new Mepa will surely have is how to tackle the backlog of cases where the authority’s rules have been broken. The new and rebranded team starts with a heavy inherited workload. It is not the end of its massive burden. Mepa cannot only look back.

It must look forward. It is part of the complicated growth dynamic that has to drive the economy. Within that dynamic there is the construction sector. It is a major polluter, no doubt about it, and new ideas have to be brought to bear on how to collect and preferably recycle its waste.

But the industry also remains a key part of the economy. As an economist I wish I could say it was no longer so because our continued relative dependence on construction has its dangers. Still, the structure of our economy is not yet such that we can do with a much reduced construction industry. The gross domestic product for 2010, which had to absorb the effect of reduced construction activity, is fresh proof of that.

A balance has to be found whereby Mepa does not brake the industry unduly and unnecessarily. Word has it, for instance, that at this stage there are few big projects in the pipeline awaiting Mepa’s assessment. Such assessment should be made without haste but also without unnecessary delay. Approval should not be given merely because projects taken in hand boost the economy. Nevertheless, feet should not be dragged. Better a no than a wait and see.

Mepa’s caseload also includes a substantial number of applications for relatively small jobs. These have their importance too. It is time to show the review that was intended to make the authority more efficient among other things in its appraisals is working.

It would be unfair to put the authority’s progress on the back of the new appointees. But a lot is expected of them and their colleagues, given that so much is to be done.