DOE gets strict over EIA

The Star, Monday September 10, 2007

LUMUT: From Oct 1, only consultants registered with the Department of Environment (DOE) will be allowed to prepare Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) reports.

Perak DOE director Abu Hasan Mohd Isa said this was because many of the previous reports were not up to mark.

“Before this, any Tom, Dick and Harry was allowed to prepare the EIAs,” he said after the launch of a two-day seminar on the improvement of EIAs here.

Abu Hasan said the department would blacklist consultants if unethical methods had been used to file the reports or certain information had been omitted to expedite the approval of projects.

“Once the consultant is blacklisted, he or she will be barred from preparing other reports.”

Abu Hasan said the EIA should not be used as a licence to approve a project but to help the authorities make sound decisions.

On the DOE’s recent challenge to cut the time taken for an EIA approval from 10 weeks to five, Abu Hasan said:

“It is not a problem. As long as the reports are properly prepared, approval can be given even within two weeks or less.”

Later, department deputy director Norazizi Adinan said that shoddy EIAs put the department under tremendous pressure as it had to assess and approve them quickly in order for projects to move on.