Access to Environmental Information in Thailand

L/O/G/O

Strengthening the Right to Information to Improve Public Health and Environmental Quality: STRIPE

THAILAND Findings on Access to

Environmental Information

Strengthening the Right to Information to Improve Public Health and Environmental Quality: STRIPE

THAILAND Findings on Access to

Environmental Information

Regional Meeting: April 29 – May 1, 2013 Jakarta, Indonesia

Somrudee Nicro, Ph.D.

ContentsContents

Access to Water Pollution Info 4

Introduction to Map Ta Phut1

Assessment of the Official Information Act (OIA) 1997

2

Access to Air Pollution Info 3

http://www.beachthailand.com/thailand-maps/

http://www.pattayadailynews.com/en/2009/09/30/76-new-maptaphut-industrial-projects-halted-by-court-injunction/

Map Ta Phut MunicipalityRayong Province, Thailand

Case Study

Map Ta PhutMap Ta Phut

http://www..mtp.rmutt.ac.th/?page_id=62

33 communitiesPopulation: 45,646 people (2008)Area: 144.575 km2

Map Ta Phut Complex: Map Ta Phut Industrial Estate Hemaraj Eastern Industrial Estate Padaeng Industrial Estate Asia Industrial Estate IRL Industrial Estate Map Ta Phut Industrial Port

Environmental Impacts

Air Pollution

Source: Eastern People Network

Coastal Erosion

Water Pollution


SoilSoil Soil

Health impactsHealth impactsHealth Impacts


Air pollution during 1996-97 caused Maptaput Panpittayakarn School to move to a new location

Assessment of the Official Information Act (1997)

Constraints / ProblemsConstraints / Problems

Official Information Act (OIA)

Officials avoid exercising their judgment whether or not to disclose information

No instruments or rules put in place for officials to exercise judgment and thereby ensure safety for the official courageous enough to disclose the information.

Section 9(8) of the OIA

Govt. agencies often do not understand whether the information in their possession are under the scope of Section 9(8).

Assessment of the OIA

Constraints / ProblemsConstraints / ProblemsRegarding Organizational StructureOOIC is under the PM Office, not independent.Large composition of the Official Information BoardOOIC is centralized.

Regarding the public

Don’t understand the lawEmpathy in exercising their rights

Regarding the Government Govt. has no enforcement measures.Govt’s fear of more people wanting to exercise their rights

Implementation / Compliance


RecommendationsRecommendations

Short-term Actions• Govt. needs to set clear policy

on enforcement of the OIA.• Provincial authorities should have

the duty to disseminate and publicize the Act in their provinces.

• Govt. agencies should reconsider fees for photocopying document

and verification of the photocopied document.

Long-term Actions• Govt. must instruct every govt.

agency to publicize the Act seriously and continuously.

• Change officials' attitude to be service-minded

• Revise the OIC's structure and improve its competency

• Develop standards and good information management system for

govt. agencies• A Personal Information Act with clear

purposes and procedures should be developed.


AIR QUALITY INFOAIR QUALITY INFOAccess to

Access to InformationAccess to Information

Findings

Oral request can’t be used as an evidence to lodge an appeal.

Requestors need to know first the scope of duties and authority of govt. agency.

Having requestors photocopy document by themselves implies that the govt. agencies denying the request.

Govt. agencies have a concern about the requester’s objectives for fear that it may violate public right under Article 56 and 57 of the 2007 Constitution.

Requestors do not submit appeal as they do not know the requesting process.

Assessment of Air quality pollution control


Objectives for the request may not be locally driven

Insufficient knowledge about the requested information

Incurred expenses

Different interpretations of agencies in enforcing Section 9(8)

Constraints / Problems




Allocate a budget for each govt. agency to facilitate public access to information

Develop a public satisfaction indicators/index to measure people’s satisfaction

Penalize officials who neglect the request

Agencies, e.g. ONEP, need to reconsider their fees currently required for document photocopying and verification.

(1/2)



Require project proponents to also submit info to ONEP in digital forms

Acknowledge digital requests and info as official.

All decisions made by Official Information Commission (OIC) should be categorized and disseminated on OOIC’s website.

In view of AEC, OOIC should propose the improvement of the law on access to information by aliens

(2/2)

Access to Water Quality Info


Time taken to obtain the information exceeds that prescribed by the law.Water monitoring covers not all parameters of water qualitySuspicion among community members whether the discharged water sample was replaced or modifiedThe public or local stakeholders have no access to the info on monitoring results.Requester received average water quality info, not the info of the specific dates they requested.When water quality was found to be poorer than standard, no actions were taken against the polluters (facilities or communities) or responsible agencies .

Assessment of Water quality pollution control

Findings


Constraints / Problems

Several laws related to water quality are difficult to understand

Officials collect water samples during office hours. But facilities discharge pollutants during the nights or heavy rainfalls.

Information received from govt. agency does not correspond with the requests, thus wasting time on both sides.

Officials who take more than 15 days (as required by law) to respond to a request faces no penalty.

Official response is written by legal officials. Some of them may not understand the reasons for denying the request. Also shortage of legal officials.



Recommendations (cont.)

Integrate all laws on water quality into a legal code.

Restructure the role and authority of agency responsible for water quality monitoring so that it can impose immediate punitive measures (~US EPA)

Provide communities trainings on laws pertaining to public rights to get access to each type of information

Require every govt. agency to disclose and disseminate information on its website, and monitored by OOIC



Recommendations

OOIC should compile decisions made by the Information Disclosure Tribunals which demands govt. agencies to disclose information on water quality, and categorize and disseminate them to the public.

OOIC should compile cases that the Tribunals decided not to have the requested info disclosed and submit them to OIC for review and setting guidelines or standard.

Each agency should develop an info system, including index, and make it easily accessible to the public so community members know where to go for the info they seek.


L/O/G/O

Thank You!Thank You!

Technology

Access to Environmental Information in Thailand