Edwin Vassallo, parliamentary secretary for Small Business and the Self-Employed, said the government wanted to improve the environmental appearance of industrial zones.

“The government wants to ensure that consumers, workers and small-business owners have the best infrastructural services in the Luqa industrial zone. In this industrial zone, there are 83 businesses that employ around 269 persons.

The Luqa industrial zone recently passed under the responsibility of the Parliamentary Secretariat for Small Business and the Self-Employed, which will ensure that after construction works are carried out, the zone is kept clean and orderly,” he said, during a visit to the zone.

Mr Vassallo told the tenants of the zone that the works already carried out, or still being carried out, include an intensive cleaning programme to clear illegally-dumped materials; dangerous buildings being demolished, temporary asphalt patching, weeding around the existing huts on a regular basis, tree pruning, and, in phases due to start, installation of lighting.