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Premier praises EPA streamlining efforts

"By the end of 2003 ... carrying out cross-agency cooperation to prevent illegal waste dumping will be realized."

Chang Chun-hsiung, premier

Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) praised the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) yesterday for its strategies to solve controversial issues, including improving the environmental impact assessment (EIA) system and managing industrial waste.

Environmentalists, however, said that more effective strategies could have been carried out, including releasing updated information about discovered illegal waste dumps.

EPA officials said that the efficiency of conducting assessments had increased and recently revised regulations would further rule out so-called barriers to investment for industry.

EPA head Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) told Premier Chang, who paid a visit to the agency yesterday morning, that the average time frame for evaluating a proposal during January to June this year was only about 40 days.

Hau wanted to offer explanation in response to criticism from President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) last week.

Chen criticized the assessment committees of the Taoyuan County government for being too picky with the EIA for an application from Quanta Display (廣輝電子), owned by Taiwan's No. 1 laptop computer maker, Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦).

Chen said last week he'd get on his hands and knees to beg if it meant a speedier review for local companies seeking approval for their industrial development plans.

Hau said yesterday that recently revised EIA regulations proposed allowing firms to establish factory sites in industrial complexes, science-based industrial parks and export processing zones without conducting the assessment in advance, as long as projected pollutant emissions remain under the acceptable limit set by the EPA.

Premier Chang said yesterday that the EPA had to play a key role in balancing ecological preservation and economic development to ensure sustainable development.

In addition, Chang praised the agency for solving a variety of controversial issues step by step, including dealing with compensation for pig farmers along five major rivers, wiping out refinery plants along the polluted Erjen River (二仁溪), and planning to establish final depositories for non-hazardous industrial waste.

"The Cabinet would fully support plans pertaining to such important issues," Chang said.

Chang said that, in the future, several agencies would manage industrial waste together. The EPA will be in charge of non-hazardous industrial waste management, while the Ministry of Economic Affairs will be responsible for handling hazardous industrial waste. The National Science Council will be the only supervisor for waste produced by firms in science-based industrial parks.

"By the end of 2003, when the project becomes effective, carrying out cross-agency cooperation to prevent illegal waste dumping will be realized," Chang said.

In May, the Cabinet approved a project proposed by the EPA to establish final depositories for industrial waste. The agency plans to build a 10-hectare dump for non-hazardous industrial waste at a site owned by Taiwan Sugar Corp in Changhua County by April next year.

"By the end of next year, we will have at least 60 hectares for use as final depositories for industrial waste," Hau said, adding that another site in Tainan County was still being discussed with the local government.

Environmentalists, however, said setting the time frame for the establishment of final depositories for industrial waste was one of the EPA's duties and felt other strategies on managing industrial waste could have been explored.

"For example, releasing updated information about discovered illegal waste dumps and establishing warning signs beside all such dumps," said Li Ken-cheng (李根政), convener of an ecological education center committee under the National Teachers' Association (全國教師會).
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