Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) for the region

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Sub-title: SAC go-ahead for UWSA factories in Tachileik threatens far-reaching pollution - စစ်ကောင်စီက UWSA အား တာချီလိတ်တွင် စက်ရုံတည်ဆောက်ခွင့်ပေးလိုက်ခြင်းသည် ကြီးမားသော ညစ်ညမ်းမှုအဖြစ် ခြိမ်းခြောက်နေ
Description: "Renewed efforts by the United Wa State Army’s Hong Pang conglomerate, backed by the SAC regime, to push through construction of two factories on confiscated land near Tachileik, a kilometer from the Thai border, are being strongly opposed by local communities, who want their farmland returned and fear far-reaching polluting impacts. The factories are planned on 100 acres of land east of Tachileik town, part of a 600- acre plot confiscated from residents of Hong Luek village in 1998-1999 by the Burma Army to set up an industrial zone. The 100 acre-plot was acquired by the Hong Pang company in 2001 for factories which were never built. In 2011, the Hong Luek farmers started appealing to the USDP government for the return of their lands in the industrial zone, which they had continued to farm where possible. Despite ongoing appeals after the NLD government came to power, on September 5, 2019, the Shan State government granted permission to Hong Pang’s Loi Sam Song company to build two factories on their 100 acre plot: a rubber crumb factory and a manganese processing factory. In October 2019, the UWSA company tried to start fencing off the land, but the farmers blocked this. The company sued them for trespass and destruction of property, but did not proceed with construction. During 2020 and early 2021, the farmers continued to block efforts by the company to fence off their farmlands, and to appeal through official channels for land return. On May 6, 2021, three months after the military coup, the company suddenly brought in bulldozers to begin levelling the land. When local farmers and monks again blocked this, police were brought in to protect the company workers, showing that the new regime was backing the UWSA’s plans. During May and June, despite intimidation, locals bravely continued to try and block the company’s construction efforts, but the company was allowed to work at night, during curfew hours, managing to lay cement fencing foundations around the land, which are difficult to remove. Construction has paused since early July, but locals assume this is because of the Covid lockdown. Locals are opposing the factory construction not only due to loss of farmlands, but also fears of pollution, particularly of the Ruak River, which flows past the industrial zone before forming the border with Thailand and flowing into the Mekong River at the Golden Triangle confluence. During the past few years, Thai water authorities have measured dangerous levels of manganese in the Ruak River, from which the Mae Sai water supply is pumped. This is likely due to contamination from existing manganese mines north of Tachileik and manganese ore stockpiles, all in the Ruak River catchment area. Construction of a manganese processing factory directly beside the Ruak River will greatly worsen the existing contamination, which is particularly dangerous for children’s health. Locals also worry about air pollution from both factories, particularly the foul smell of rubber processing, which will permeate the eastern suburbs of Tachileik and adjoining areas of Mae Sai in Thailand, causing adverse health impacts and damaging the tourist industry. Manganese mining and widespread rubber cultivation in Tachileik have already negatively impacted the local environment and livelihoods, for the enrichment of military elites and outside investors. The planned factories are poised to inflict even further damage, on both sides of the border. SHRF strongly supports the brave efforts of the Hong Luek villagers to protect their lands, and urges the SAC and UWSA to immediately cancel the planned factory projects, so that the lands can be returned to their rightful owners. We are inspired by the Mae Sai residents’ successful blocking 20 years ago of Hong Pang’s efforts to build a polluting coal-fired power plant in Tachileik, and hope that Mae Sai communities will mobilize again to join this new struggle to protect our shared Ruak river basin environment..."
Source/publisher: Shan Human Rights Foundation
2021-08-26
Date of entry/update: 2021-08-26
Grouping: Individual Documents
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Size: 8.16 MB 6.82 MB 7.9 MB 7.89 MB
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Description: "Land governance has become attached to environmental agendas in a number of ways. The best recognised of these is the cordoning off of forest land for conservation in national parks and other protected areas. In many parts of the Mekong Region, this has become an issue where conservation zones have been declared in areas previously settled, criminalising the largely ethnic minority farmers who find themselves living in such areas. More recently, "green grabbing" has become an issue as environmentally-inspired programs such as REDD+ assign recoverable value in forest carbon and hence give new incentives to acquire rights to forest land that is part of the livelihood domain of smallholders. Other environment-related issues include the pressures places on lowlands - especially delta areas - by climate change, the damage done to soils by industrial agriculture, and the environmental externalities of modern practices that impact on nearby smallholders.....Key trends and dynamics: Environmental protections in the Mekong region are frequently threatened by commodity markets. Most directly, an interest in timber products can lead to illegal deforestation, such as in a multimillion dollar smuggling industry in luxury rosewood to China (Environmental Investigation Agency 2014; Global Witness 2015; Singh 2013), and wood from around Indochina that is processed in 2 Vietnam to feed demand for cheap furniture in Europe and the US (Environmental Investigation Agency 2011; Environmental Investigation Agency and Telepak 2008). Commodification and associated crop booms place more indirect pressure on forests, such as in the expansion of rubber in the 2000s due to high prices, and the rise of tissue-culture banana in northern Myanmar since 2015 (Hayward et al. 2020). For example, in Lao PDR an estimated 14.43% of natural forest was converted to plantation forest between 2010-2017 (Wang et al. 2019). In Cambodia, nearly half of the concessions given out from 2000-2012 were forested in 2000, and there have been higher rates of deforestation within concession areas than in other areas (Davis et al. 2015). Some ELCs encroach into protected forest areas and wildlife sanctuaries (Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association 2014). In Thailand, Zheng et al. (Zeng, Gower, and Wood 2018) identify forest loss in the northern province of Nan due to increases in maize production. There are other knock-on effects from timber extraction. The combination of deforestation and intensified agriculture, particularly monocropping, contributes to soil and landscape degradation (Lestrelin 2010). The shift to industrialised farming stresses freshwater ecosystems, threatening their ability to provide for agriculture and food security (Johnston et al. 2010; Thomas et al. 2012). A further linkage ties deforestation with concerns over the impacts of climate change. In particular, the increasing frequency and severity of natural disasters impact upon farmer strategies. An example is found in the aftermath of the 2011 floods in Thailand, and the resulting shift in crop choices (Panichvejsunti et al. 2018). Environmental disasters can also create new precarities in land tenure. Following the 2004 tsunami, there has been significant dispossession of land for indigenous communities in the south of Thailand (Neef et al. 2018). The industrialised use of water in the region is having a profound impact upon supported ecosystems, including communities living in proximity to water sources or courses. Nowhere is this more apparent to see than in the plight of the Mekong, no longer a free-flowing but a humanmanaged river due to the extensive number of hydropower projects interrupting its route from China to Vietnam, with plans afoot for numerous further projects. Each venture has considerable environmental costs, both individually and cumulatively, with communities forcibly displaced to make way for new dams. A further threat to water provisions sees large-scale infrastructure projects on wetlands surrounding cities that provide a vital filtering service to waste-water. Contentious examples are the construction of Suvarnabhumi International Airport on the Cobra Swamp on the outskirts of Bangkok, and projects on That Luang Marsh in Vientiane. Meanwhile, a number of lakes in and around Phnom Penh have been filled in to create land for commercial developments. In the context of urbanisation processes, a lack of coordinated land use planning is creating a platform for precarity against environment disasters. Beringer and Kaewsuk (Beringer and Kaewsuk 2018) show how infrastructure development is increasing the risk of flooding risks in Khon Kaen city, northern Thailand. Climate-change mitigation policies in Myanmar, combined with resource investment through concessions and other large-scale land acquisitions, are creating overlapping disputes on land. In Myanmar, this exacerbates rather than alleviates tensions within the peace process (Woods 2015). Work and Thuon (Work and Thuon 2017) note how in Prey Lang, Cambodia, industrial tree plantations qualify as forest restoration, and local communities are unable to access areas of land around ELCs that have been mapped as protection zones. A key strategy to identify and address drivers of deforestation and degradation, and incorporate them into climate change mitigation, has been the UN-backed REDD program in its various iterations (Broadhead and Izquierdo 2010). There are concerns that REDD projects are re-centralising forest management as opposed to promoting decentralised governance that can more easily strengthen local resource tenure security (Baird 2014). Claims on forest carbon are reorienting power relations and property rights in forest areas, potentially creating new fields for dispute (Mahanty et al. 2013). Such programs are also seen to justify and help promote commercial farming. For example, the promotion of rubber plantations by the Vietnamese government is aligned with REDD+ and Forest Law Enforcement, Governance, and Trade (FLEGT) programmes (To Xuan Phuc and Tran Huu Nghi 2014b). However, Work (Work 2015) shows how REDD carbon-capture programs in Cambodia are being restricted due to a monopoly on the timber trade by domestic elites. Rather than compound tenure issues, there is evidence that for REDD schemes to be successful, they first need to directly address potential areas of dispute, otherwise deforestation may continue. Bourgoin and Castella (Bourgoin and Castella 2011) provide an example of such a process in the use of participatory land use planning as part of a REDD project in northern Lao PDR. Approaching the topic from a different angle, the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security (VGGT) recognise that strong support for the tenure of vulnerable and marginalised people can also help protect them from the impacts of climate change, including climate-induced displacement (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations 2012)..."
Creator/author:
Source/publisher: Mekong Land Research Forum
2021-05-00
Date of entry/update: 2021-06-24
Grouping: Individual Documents
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Format : pdf
Size: 349.28 KB (13 pages)
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Description: "MCRB, in partnership with Metta Development Foundation and Environmental Conservation and Farmer Development Organization (Shan), held a workshop on Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) in Taunggyi on 3-4 October for around 40 partiicpants from civil society organisations (CSOs) and community-based organisations (CBOs) from southern Shan State to follow up an earlier introductory workshop in June. Senior office-holders in the new Myanmar Environmental Assessment Association, which brings together EIA consultants and other experts, presented on EIA practice from the 3rd party/consultant perspective. Shwetaung/Apache Cement presented their experience from a company perspective and made available hard copies of their EIA/EMP and Biodiversity Action Plan for study..."
Source/publisher: Myanmar Centre for Responsible Business (MCRB)
2018-10-15
Date of entry/update: 2018-10-27
Grouping: Individual Documents
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Description: Introduction to the First Edition: "EarthRights International (ERI), alongside its partners in the Mekong Legal Network (MLN), is working directly to build the capacity of communities, campaigners and lawyers to engage in Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) processes in the Mekong region . Consequently, ERI and the MLN have collaborated to produce this original manual for EIA practitioners in the six Mekong countries which specifically targets government decision - makers, investors, lawyers and other professionals working on the implementation of EIA. The result is this unique practical guide for implementing EIA in the Mekong, which both ERI and the MLN are strategically placed to disseminate to relevant EIA stakeholders, especially project-affected communities across the region. The Environmental Impact Assessment in the Mekong Region manual is the first time that anyone has sought to bring together in one volume an analysis of the EIA systems of each of the six Mekong countries, including the common themes and approaches. This was also the first project undertaken by the MLN, in collaboration with ERI. As a result, there was a lot of learning throughout the process of collaboration and collation from all involved. Whilst all of the members of the MLN are experienced lawyers, we found that there was a gap between law and practice. There was also the need to be able to communicate in a transboundary way, while acknowledging that different countries used different processes and with some different approaches to EIA. The First Edition is the result of this period of collaboration. We have tried to ensure accuracy and completeness. However, we also recognise that there is always room for improvement. We welcome any comments, criticisms or complaints. Our aim is to provide the materials and continue the existing discussion on the value of EIA in the region and how EIA can be improved. The work of the Mekong Partnership for the Environment, and the work of PACT, has been devoted to the role of EIA in achieving sustainable development. Through the work of PACT and many other practitioners and communities, the profile of EIA has been raised. Many discussions are occurring to improve the standard and value of EIA. In particular, the development of Regional Guidelines on Public Participation and the drafting of national guidelines on Public Participation in EIA for both Cambodia and Myanmar are all indicators of the importance of enhancing public participation in EIA. This First Edition is aimed at practitioners, civil society, lawyers, EIA consultants and project proponents. We hope that, by under standing the legal obligations under national law, all stakeholders will work together to pursue constant improvement in the EIA process across the Mekong region."
Creator/author: Matthew Baird, Sor Rattanamanee Polkla, Songkrant Pongboonjun, Manolinh Thepkhamvong, Dang Dinh Bach, Tep Neth, Than Than Aye, Oo Kyaw Thein, Jinmei Liu, Rémy Kinna.
Source/publisher: EarthRights International (ERI)
2016-10-00
Date of entry/update: 2016-11-17
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 3.57 MB
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