The Environment Ministry wants the people and companies extracting sand and stone from riverbeds to stay in jail and pay a fine of 150,000 lei ($7.500.)

The Ministry will have the Government adopt today such a bill.

The phenomenon has acquired worrying proportions after companies committing to cleanse riverbeds, actually extracted the sand and pebbles and sold them out.

The damages brought about to the state are assessed at two million lei, as 250,000 of cubic meters of solid sediments have been extracted for the last 15 years from the rivers Prut and Dniester.