Topics: Access to Information

This article is the third in a series on WRI’s latest report, Thirsting for Justice: Transparency and Poor People’s Struggle for Clean Water in Indonesia, Mongolia, and Thailand. This post focuses on Indonesia, where industrial runoff is degrading the water fishermen depend on.

Roshadi Jamaludin has fished from his local pond for only three years, but everyone in his village remembers what it was like before the pulp and paper and textile mills started releasing wastewater into the Ciujung River, which fills it. Roshadi, who prefers his nickname, Adi, commented, “Long before the fishpond got affected by pollution, everything was really smooth. There was no disease on the shrimp, crab and milkfish. Their growth was also good.”

For generations, people in Adi’s village of Tengkurak, in Serang, Java, Indonesia, have relied on the Ciujung River as their daily source of water for bathing and cooking. Village fishermen set up enclosed ponds on the bank of the river to raise and sell shrimp and fish. But in the 1990s, after rapid industrialization in the area, community members noticed a significant decline in water quality and suspected that industrial wastewater was to blame. Since then, pond fishermen have noticed drastic decreases in the quality of their catch and in their income. Shrimp populations have declined, with catches falling from 30-50 kilograms to 15-20 kilograms. Adi agrees, “Daily income is not available if there is wastewater. If wastewater goes to the pond, everything is off.”

After years of trying to engage the mills and the Indonesian government through protests, meetings and even the courts, people in Serang are still fighting to restore the Ciujung and protect their livelihoods. Yet even after a 2013 government audit of the main waste contributor found multiple problems with its practices and violations of water pollution laws, the community is still struggling. They want answers about the pollutants contaminating their river and whether the companies are releasing more pollution than allowed under wastewater discharge permits.

“(We received) no notice from government when wastewater came along, came uninvited,” confirms Adi. “Information is desperately needed. When there is wastewater, come discuss in forum. Just to let me know. All is helpful.”

Transparency Laws Ineffective

Adi is not alone. Many communities throughout Indonesia and Asia are struggling to get the information they need to address the impacts from rising industrial pollution and weak enforcement of pollution control laws. As documented in WRI’s new publication, Thirsting for Justice: Transparency and Poor People’s Struggle for Clean Water in Indonesia, Mongolia and Thailand, these Asian governments have strong transparency laws that clearly require the disclosure of environmental information. But inadequate implementation and ineffective disclosure mechanisms are preventing poor, often marginalized community members from getting the local, facility-specific public health information they need.

Indonesia is trying, despite limited budgets and resources. It passed a Right to Know law in 2008 so citizens could request information from the government, implemented a public ratings program showing how industries comply with pollution control laws, and mandated the release of government environmental impact assessments, which set forth standards for private companies and monitoring requirements. It’s developing a public, online environmental database. Despite these efforts, information on local water quality is still not reaching communities like Tengkurak.

Impacts on Participation

Governments in Asia and across the world have recognized access to information as an essential prerequisite for participation and accountability. It can help build public trust in government decisions; ensure proper compliance and enforcement of laws; tailor solutions to local socio-cultural and environmental conditions, and increase a sense of ownership over the process and outcomes. Sharing information clearly with communities can inspire citizen activism and help the government as it works to identify and correct environmental problems.

But without meaningful access to information, local communities are handicapped. For Adi and other communities throughout Indonesia, Mongolia and Thailand, this lack of access is hurting their ability to protect their livelihoods and earn a living. Without the power of knowledge, they can’t hold local government and companies accountable for the impacts of contaminated water, or participate in government decisions about pollution control and enforcement that could help clean up the river.

The report cites numerous examples. In a village in Mongolia, herders fear that mining companies are polluting the Tuul River and making their livestock sick. In Thailand, independent researchers have confirmed that wells in the industrial community of Map Ta Phut are contaminated with mercury and arsenic. But without documentation of water contamination or information about the companies causing the pollution, residents don’t have the facts they need to stop them from violating their permits.

Actions to Improve Transparency

Governments, civil society and international donors have many options to improve responsiveness on water issues. They can release local water pollution information in non-technical formats, like radio broadcasts, pictures and signs that citizens can understand without translation or internet access. They can organize local environmental data and publicly provide accurate, up-to-date information about water use, health risks, and types and amounts of pollutants entering waterways, as well as company-specific data. Civil society organizations and international donors can advocate and invest in initiatives that promote better access to water pollution information.

For now, Adi watches his catches dwindle and his pond degrade. For citizens like him throughout Asia, implementing these recommendations will help ensure he gets the local, facility-specific and public health information he wants. It will ensure he has the power to fight for water justice. 

This article is the second in a series on WRI’s latest report, Thirsting for Justice: Transparency and Poor People’s Struggle for Clean Water in Indonesia, Mongolia, and Thailand. This post focuses on Mongolia, where toxic chemicals from gold mining threaten residents and their herds.

Baasan Tsend, a nomadic herder living in the Mongolian gold mining region of Zaamar, suspects that the water he uses for drinking, bathing and raising his livestock is toxic. Over the past two decades, he’s watched dozens of multi-million-dollar corporations and powerful Mongolian companies pillage his ancestral homeland in search of gold. He’s seen these mines contaminate the groundwater and rivers that have sustained his family’s way of life for generations and consoled neighbors whose animals died after drinking the polluted water.

“We cannot live here,” Tsend says, holding his grandson’s hand. “It is now impossible for any human or animal to drink from that water.”

Like Tsend’s village, poor communities across Mongolia—those that still depend on local water sources—have suffered most from the water pollution that has accompanied the country’s gold rush. Lead, arsenic and other toxic chemicals released during gold extraction processes have leached into Mongolia’s groundwater and flowed untreated into rivers. Exposure to these pollutants can cause severe, long-term health effects, from skin and bladder cancers to irreversible immune system and neurological disorders.

Contaminated water also threatens Mongolian herders’ livelihoods. For many families, livestock are their primary, and often only, source of income. When their animals get sick or die from drinking bad water, herders are left with nothing. They have few financial safety nets and limited economic opportunities.

As the scramble for gold in Tsend’s village heats up again, water pollution is also on the rise across Mongolia and throughout Asia. Each year, industrial facilities dump 300-400 million tons of heavy metals, toxic sludge and other pollutants into the world’s waters, and in Asia, 80-90 percent of wastewater flows untreated back into ground and surface water sources. Yet secrecy around the amount and type of chemicals that companies discharge is still the norm, especially in Asia. Worldwide, 80 percent of countries do not provide comprehensive information on the amount of pollution that companies release into the environment.

A new WRI report, Thirsting for Justice: Transparency and Poor People’s Struggle for Clean Water in Indonesia, Mongolia, and Thailand, examines vulnerable communities’ access to water pollution information in these three countries. It finds that, like many Asian nations, Mongolia, Indonesia and Thailand have all established comprehensive laws that mandate proactive disclosure of water pollution information to the public. Mongolia’s laws, for instance, recognize citizens’ right to obtain environmental data from the government, and establish concrete steps officials must take to release this information to local communities. Yet WRI’s report shows that, despite passing these strong “right to know” laws, Mongolia, Indonesia and Thailand are putting many of their poorest communities at risk by not effectively telling them if their water is safe to use.

Resolving this environmental injustice will require these governments, and others across Asia, to address three barriers that obstruct local communities’ access to information:

Gaps in Local Water Quality Information

Across the world, people need to know if their water sources are too contaminated to drink, cook with, fish or give to their livestock. They need to understand what pollutants companies are releasing into their water sources, how these chemicals will impact their health, which companies are contaminating their waterways and what steps governments have taken to prevent further degradation. Access to this information not only allows families to make more informed choices about their water use, but also enables them to monitor industrial facilities’ compliance with environmental regulations and hold law-breaking polluters to account.

But in Mongolia, Indonesia and Thailand, the data that governments disclose concern ecosystem impacts or threats to overall water quality―not the local, facility-specific and health information that communities need. Mongolia, for instance, does not disclose individual facilities’ pollution discharges, issue permits regulating these discharges or provide companies’ compliance records. Our research partners were also unable to locate any information about health risks associated with using contaminated water, or water quality data for local sources.

In Indonesia, community members face comparable challenges accessing facility-specific information. Although their government publicly rates companies’ compliance with Indonesian environmental regulations, including water pollution controls, officials do not disclose the criteria they use to evaluate compliance. Nor do they release any information on the amount or type of pollutants that facilities dump into local waterways.

Inaccessible Water Pollution Information

The information that Indonesian, Mongolian and Thai governments do release is inaccessible to local community members, many of whom live below the poverty line and reside far from government offices. Villagers in Tsend’s hometown of Tumstii, for example, have few computers and limited internet access, making it nearly impossible for them to navigate national websites or access online databases.

Similarly, when community members in Thailand’s Rayong province submitted information requests to get water data that they couldn’t find online, officials told them that they had to search for the documents in Bangkok—a demand that shifted the burden onto poor villagers to cover travel costs and forfeit a day’s earnings.

Technical, Hard-to-Understand Data

Even when people can successfully access water pollution information, the data that governments provide is so technical that community members cannot understand it. Indonesian fishermen in Serang, a village on the Ciujung River, had to rely on civil society organizations to translate the raw data provided into pictures that they could understand. Mongolian herders also needed local nonprofits to explain the technical responses they obtained through information requests. Community members we interviewed in Thailand received official documents in English, a language they couldn’t speak.

Suffering the Consequences

Without access to pollution information, Tsend can’t protect his grandson from drinking contaminated water. He can’t determine whether it’s safer to give his herd groundwater from a well or let them drink from the river. He can’t meaningfully participate in local decision-making, pressure his government to protect his community from exploitation, or hold companies responsible for environmental violations.

Improving transparency of water pollution data will give Tsend’s village and poor communities throughout Asia access to the information their governments are legally obligated to provide and a voice in the water justice movement. It is an essential first step in claiming their right to clean water. 

This article is the first in a series on WRI’s latest report, Thirsting for Justice: Transparency and Poor People’s Struggle for Clean Water in Indonesia, Mongolia, and Thailand. This post focuses on a Thai community’s fight for information on industrial water pollution.

Complaints about pollution in Map Ta Phut, Thailand, a sprawling industrial estate south of Bangkok, are not new. For decades, residents have voiced concerns about the pollution pouring from more than 140 petrochemical plants, oil refineries and coal-fired power stations. Researchers from nearby organizations and international universities have confirmed local communities’ fears, discovering dangerously high levels of mercury and arsenic in their water. Many have ranked Map Ta Phut as Thailand’s number one toxic hot spot.

Exposure to these pollutants can cause serious health effects. A 2003 Thailand National Cancer Institute study found unusually high rates of cervical, blood and other cancers in Rayong Province, where Map Ta Phut is located. Provincial public health officials have also reported increased numbers of birth deformities, disabilities and chromosome abnormalities, while environmental activists have claimed that pollution from the estate caused at least 2,000 cancer-related deaths from 1996 to 2009.

Yet the Thai government has not responded to communities’ concerns about health risks or made any significant attempt to clean up the region’s water.

Nangsao Witlawan, a former oil refinery worker and Map Ta Phut resident, has stage four cervical cancer and has unanswered questions about her water. But after meeting with officials and company representatives, she still doesn’t know if the water is safe to use or contaminated.

“All the government services — municipalities, public health, the Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning, and the Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand — realized what has been happening with pollution in our community, but they don’t tell or give us the true information,” Witlawan says. “I’ve never received correct and clear information about the water.”

Witlawan’s story, although commonplace across Asia, is surprising in Thailand. On paper, the country has one of the world’s most advanced legal environmental disclosure regimes. Its constitution protects citizens’ right to receive information from the government before the approval or implementation of activities that might have serious environmental, health or quality-of-life impacts on their communities. Nearly ten years ago, it passed strong rules under its Freedom of Information (FOI) law that require officials to proactively disclose environmental and health information to the public. In theory, such legislation should enable Witlawan and all Map Ta Phut residents to access water pollution information. But as a new WRI report finds, implementation of these laws is ineffective, in Thailand and throughout Asia.

The report, Thirsting for Justice: Transparency and Poor People’s Struggle for Clean Water in Indonesia, Mongolia, and Thailand, analyzes vulnerable communities’ access to water pollution information in these three countries. It finds that, like many nations in the region, they have made real progress in protecting citizens’ right to environmental information and enacting laws to ensure governments release water pollution data to local communities. However, as WRI’s study illustrates, weak implementation and limited investments in information disclosure systems are undermining strong “right to know” laws in Thailand, Indonesia and Mongolia. These governments are failing to answer questions about water pollution―information they are legally required to provide.

Proactively Disclosed Information

The Thai, Mongolian and Indonesian governments have made notable progress in establishing “right to know” laws specifying the proactive disclosure of water pollution information. In Thailand, for instance, officials must release companies’ permitting documents, information on the amount of pollutants released, and explanations of public health impacts. Indonesian and Mongolian legislation also mandate that the government provide water quality data, updates on cleanup efforts and information on livelihood impacts. But new research shows that, with few exceptions, these governments are not effectively disclosing the required data, and public access to crucial water pollution information is limited.

Responses to Information Requests

Working with local partners in Thailand, Mongolia and Indonesia, WRI tested the strength of countries’ Freedom of Information laws by tracking 174 local community members’ information requests.

In Indonesia and Mongolia, government agencies ignored over half of information requests, failing to issue even a formal refusal. In some instances, officials asked community members to justify their requests before agreeing to respond, though the law does not require citizens to provide a rationale. Although the Thai government responded to 74 percent of information requests, officials took over 60 days—four times the legally mandated timeframe of 15 days—to reply. Even when officials in all three countries did respond to information requests, they often provided data that related only tangentially to citizens’ questions.

The Ramifications of Poor Implementation

In Map Ta Phut, such poor transparency is undermining public trust in the government. A neighbor of Witlawan’s, Kanis Phonnawin, worries that officials manipulate water pollution data to benefit the estate’s industries. 

“Government agencies paid very little attention to the water problems,” Phonnawin says. “Also, information about each issue released by a government agency always lacks reliability, because most of the information is biased for the sake of petrochemical factories.”

Without the trust of its citizens, a government’s capacity to implement policies, build public support for necessary reforms and enforce the law suffers. A radical shift in information sharing is needed to improve access to water pollution information, restore Phonnawin’s faith in her government, and enable Witlawan to hold companies that do not comply with environmental regulations to account. Improving transparency―not only in Thailand, but across Asia and the developing world―is a critical step forward in the water justice movement.