Rubbish disposal in Thailand can be a very dirty business, metaphorically as well as literally speaking. The recent fire at a garbage dump in tambon Phraeksa, Samut Prakan province, smouldered for days, necessitating the temporary evacuation of people living in its immediate vicinity and blanketing large swathes of eastern Bangkok in haze. And this past Sunday, another blaze erupted at a dump site in Samut Prakan, this time in Bang Phli district.
Garbage dumps are a source of income for many. In this photo, people search for recyclable waste at a landfill site in the Bangkok metropolitan area. Some garbage-dump operators even collect admission fees from such scavengers.
Police investigating the cause of the Phraeksa conflagration found evidence of hazardous waste thought to have originated from factories. According to an official from the Department of Special Investigations (DSI), the owner of the Phraeksa site never obtained the permits necessary to legally operate a landfill and while a license had been granted by the local Tambon Administration Organisation, this was only for a private rubbish dump which was not subject to strict environmental controls. The same operator also ran another dump site, 4km away, and the DSI official recalled that there had been a fire there, too, several years before.
And the relevant local authorities could not claim ignorance either. For people living close to both sites had filed official complaints, reporting the dumping of toxic waste and warning of the risk of water pollution.
These are certainly not the first reports of such criminally irresponsible behaviour and, sadly, are unlikely to be the last. For the garbage-disposal business in this country, which was once dominated by a small number of firms who adhered to environmental regulations, has been attracting a new breed of player in recent years — “influential” figures, local politicians and others with powerful connections who are willing to bend the law and go to any length to ensure that their oh-so-profitable schemes continue uninterrupted.
A vacant plot of land, reliable truck drivers and sufficient influence to arm-twist anyone who put obstacles in their way. That was all that was necessary to set up one of these illegal dump sites that surreptitiously accept lorry-loads of harmful chemicals and other poisonous industrial waste. Some of the more wily operators hold permits to handle household garbage and use this as a cover, hiding toxic waste beneath ordinary domestic trash. More unscrupulous operators do not even bother to apply for permits, they simply spirit dangerous waste away from industrial plants under cover of darkness and secrete it in open pits dug at some illegal dump site. Then there are the truck-drivers who pick up a consignment of waste from a factory and issue the correct receipt to the foreman, but then substantially increase the profit they make by fly-tipping, disposing of their load on urban waste ground or in deserted rural areas instead of at a properly licensed landfill.
"There are three things that define the character of this illegal garbage-disposal business,” said Tiwa Tong-on, a community leader in Chon Buri province who was active in organising local resistance to the expansion of a toxic waste dump near his home in tambon Bor Win, Si Racha district.
"First, these garbage dumps are usually open pits or huge plots of level ground. Second is that the owners of these pieces of land or the people who control the logistics of the operation have good connections with influential figures such as local politicians. And, third, the people living in the vicinity of these dumps are usually powerless and too afraid to speak up.’’
The consequences for those brave enough to openly oppose illegal dump sites have sometimes been fatal. Two activists have been killed as a direct result of their participation in campaigns against garbage landfills. Prajob Nao-opas, head of Ban Nong Nair, a village in Chachoengsao’s Phanom Sarakham district, was gunned down in broad daylight in February last year. One of the three suspects arrested for the murder is an adviser to a private company involved in the disposal of industrial waste.
A similar case took place in Samut Prakan 12 years before. Upset by a garbage landfill in Rachathewa, Bang Phli district, a local resident called Suwat Wongpiyasathit dug deep, exposing massive corruption at the policy level. The scam involved the granting of illegal dumping permits and attempts by a local authority in Samut Prakan to revise planning regulations so that the land in question could be rezoned to accommodate its use as a rubbish tip. Suwat was sitting in a shop one day, discussing the issue with his neighbours, when he was killed in a hail of bullets.
Compared to those two slain activists, Tiwa has been lucky in that the waste-disposal company he fought against in Chon Buri held a proper legal permit to operate its dump in Si Racha and it also had a good corporate reputation it needed to protect. The firm reacted to the protests against expansion by upping sticks and moving its operations to a new location in Saraburi province.
Tiwa has continued his activism by investigating illegal dump sites in other areas. Recently, he teamed up with Earth Ecological Alert & Recovery (Earth), a conservation group that is active nationwide, and the Office of the Ombudsman to conduct an in-depth study of this lucrative but environmentally destructive business.
To gather information, he and his team have been following up on complaints lodged by villagers, going to sites and recording what they find there.
"Trucks that carry toxic waste tend to look very ordinary since their loads are typically covered with canvas. On the dump site, the open pits are also kept covered with thick sheets of canvas. Trucks will drive into the property, the canvas covers are lifted and the whole task of tipping the waste into a pit is done very quickly. Then, a backhoe is used to put a layer of earth on top, the canvas covers are replaced and it looks like nothing has happened,’’ Tiwa explained.
"It is very hard, almost impossible, to keep track of all these operators and arrest those who break the law,’’ he added.
No comprehensive information is available on the number of illegal dump sites there might be throughout the country. An initial study conducted by local civic groups and the Office of the Ombudsman found around 40 such sites scattered around the provinces of Prachin Buri, Chachoengsao, Chon Buri, Rayong and Samut Prakan.
Most of these sites are in what is known as the Eastern Seaboard region, the location of a host of industrial estates where factories produce a good deal of chemical by-products and other toxic waste. The group searching for illegal dump sites is to publicise its findings some time later this year along with a list of recommendations, one of which is a suggestion that every industrial estate or every province with a lot of factories be required to set up a properly-run industrial landfill.
All you need to set up an illegal garbage dump is a few trucks to transport the trash and a vacant plot of land in a remote location or else next to a community that will not dare to create a rumpus.
