VILLAGERS UP IN ARMS AGAINST HUGE PROJECT

       A group of 500 villagers living near a huge steel-mill project in Prachuap Khiri Khan's Bang Saphan district yesterday gathered outside the Industry Ministry asking it not to permit construction while a pending administrative decision is not yet reached.
       Protest leaders also demanded that Industry Minister Charnchai Chairungrueng give them a written promise that he would comply with their demand and nothing would be done against the villagers' will until he returned from an overseas trip on September 13.
       Jintana Kaewkhao, a protest leader, said the Administrative Court had issued an injunction halting the project of Sahaviriya Steel Industry until mandatory environmental studies were finalised and disputes over land ownership settled. She also demanded that in future other projects that cause large-scale pollution should not be permitted near the district.
       The group later submitted a request to a government agency at the Goverment House asking it to invalidate an environment impact assessment (EIA) result in favour of the public company. The assessment only had recommendations and opinions of government experts on science, technology and industry but left out those of doctors and experts on public health.
       The Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning (ONEP) said later that it had twice rejected an earlier EIA submitted by the project owner, last time in July last year, because it was not complete on more than 100 issues.
       Suchaya Amralikhit, a senior ONEP official, said those issues included conveyors of industrial materials were too near to communities, as were piles of those materials. The other issues, which still need improvements, are wastewater management, water drainage, impact on local tourism, public-health concerns and visual pollution.
       ONEP also requires the project owner to propose measures to restore biodiversity in nearby forests and to accept comments from a local natural conservation group allied to the villagers.
       Project owner Sahaviriya Steel Mill later issued a statement saying the project site was not located in a forest reserve, as alleged by villagers, thus the project was not the reason behind repeated flooding and pollution in the forest reserve and nearby areas.
       Chaiphat Khemaphirak, a senior company official, said only a one-rai plot, out of the entire 222-rai project site, was located in an area adjacent to the forest reserve.
       "The company has created a 123-rai buffer zone, where green projects are situated, between the project site and the forest reserve," he added.
       He said the steel mill operation, when carried out, would generate pollution and industrial waste at a level under the legal limit. He added that Sahaviriya Group's entire corporate standard on health and environment management, which was certified by Mahidol University, was the best in the country.