Below is the global petition against Japan’s export of incineration
technology to developing countries in South East Asia or other areas.
Currently, we at the GAIA network are concerned about Ebara’s huge
gasification incinerator in Malaysia which is planned for construction in
the middle of a tropical forest with water catchment providing clean water
to about to 200 million people. Such incineration of waste causes many
environmental hazards.
Please consider the situation and kindly forward this mail to your friends.
You can access from here :
http://www.no-burn.org/action/broga2let.html
Learn more about GAIA at this English website:
http://www.no-burn.org/about/index.html
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Global Appeal to Stop Japanese Funding and Construction of Broga
Incinerator in Malaysia
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His Excellency Junichiro Koizumi
Prime Minister
Government of Japan
Dear Prime Minister Koizumi,
GLOBAL APPEAL TO STOP JAPANESE FUNDING AND CONSTRUCTION OF BROGA INCINERATOR
IN MALAYSIA
As members of the global community, we write to you, Mr. Prime Minister, to
put across our strong disapproval for the use of Japanese yen loans, grants,
export subsidies and guarantees to promote and/or fund the export of
Japanese incinerators to countries in Asia and elsewhere.
Incineration-focused ?gsolutions,?h from our standpoint, will only put the
lives of citizens and their communities at risk instead of helping them
prevent and reduce waste, scale up recycling, generate jobs and work towards
Zero Waste.
Of particular concern to us is the suspected plan to use Japanese taxpayers
?f money for building a gigantic 1,500 tonne/day incinerator for municipal
solid waste in Broga, Selangor, Malaysia – a hilly, forested zone and a
water catchment area supplying drinking water to over 333 residential
housing estates of about 2 million people. We are appalled that a monstrous
waste burner will be constructed in an environmentally-sensitive area
despite objection and protest from concerned citizens. This, we hope, is
not the kind of development cooperation that Japan would want to subscribe
to and promote to its neighbors.
Ebara Corporation holds the contract to design and construct the
gasification-type incinerator that is disturbingly on a pilot stage in Japan
and in much smaller capacities. Concerned community members and civil
society groups are opposed to the plan because it employs unverified
technology to be built by a controversy-ridden firm, it contravenes laws and
polices, and imperils the society with enormous environmental, health,
safety and financial costs. The high disapproval of 85 per cent among
residents should compel your government to critically review any Japanese
financing of this controversial project. Japan should be sensitive to the
sentiments of affected communities and should not be seen as imposing a
project that is not welcomed by the local people.
We find it exceedingly outrageous that Japanese companies, with backing from
the government, are seeking new markets outside Japan for their
incinerators, deceivingly selling them as ?gsustainable?h and
?genvironment-friendly?h solutions for handling waste. Incinerators,
including those depicted as ?gstate-of-the-art,?h endanger public health and
the environment with toxic emissions, destroy huge quantities of valuable
resources, burden importing countries with unbearable debts, weaken
recycling, hinder job creation and community development and concentrate
financial gains in the hands of big businesses.
Government promotion and funding of Japanese incinerator projects abroad is
a blatant disrespect to the ongoing efforts by the global community to
reduce and eliminate releases of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) to the
environment. The Stockholm Convention on POPs, which Japan has already
ratified, calls for the “minimization with the ultimate goal of elimination”
of 12 priority POPs, four of which are by-products of waste combustion:
dioxins, furans, hexachlorobenzene and polychlorinated biphenyls. The
Convention further calls for the use of substitute processes to prevent the
formation and release of these byproduct POPs. Constructing new
incinerators in Japan or offshore is akin to creating new sources of POPs
and thus violates the spirit and purpose of the Convention, denying the
people their right to a healthy environment and a sustainable future.
We urge you, Mr. Prime Minister, to ensure that any Japan-assisted projects
overseas observe the fundamental principle of the ?gcommunity right to
know.?h As the world?fs top donor of ODA, we urge you to guarantee that
affected communities and population groups are fully informed and consulted.
We particularly would like to see national governments entering into a free
and open dialogue with the civil society and giving stakeholders full access
to information on projects that will affect their health, livelihood and
future. As to the proposed Broga incinerator, we urge you to ensure that
the voices of concerned communities are duly listened to and respected by
decision makers in both Japan and Malaysia.
We call upon you, Mr. Prime Minister, to act upon our demands:
1. That the Japan Bank for International Cooperation, Japan International
Cooperation Agency and other related offices stop promoting and funding the
construction of waste incinerators in Asia and the Pacific and the rest of
the world.
2. That Japanese incinerator companies desist from exporting their harmful
and unsustainable products.
3. That Japan withdraws any funding commitment for the Broga incinerator
project in Malaysia in view of the broad citizens?f opposition.
Add your message here:
CC:
IN JAPAN
Ministry of the Environment, Ministry of Economy and Industries, Nippon
Keidanren, Democratic Party, Komei, Social Democratic Party, Japan Communist
Party, Midorinokaigi
IN MALAYSIA
Office of the Prime Minister, Ministry of Science, Technology and
Environment, Ministry of Housing and Local Government, Ministry of Finance ,
Office of the Chief Minister of Selangor, Director General of the Department
of Environment, Director General of the Department of Local Government,
Director General of the Economic Planning Unit, Embassy of Japan
*Name:
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