Thailand To Become Dumping Ground for New Mountains of Plastic Waste?

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fountainhall

Thailand To Become Dumping Ground for New Mountains of Plastic Waste?

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A law set to take effect in October will create a loophole and open the doors to Thailand being able not only to dump more locally produced plastic waste in the country but also accept plastic waste from abroad.
The law amends the 1992 Factory Act and is set to take effect in October. The amendment was approved in late February by the National Legislative Assembly . . . It was one of many laws the outgoing military junta rushed through parliament before a contentious general election in late March.

Under the amended rules, only industrial companies with more than 50 employees and machinery exceeding 50 horsepower are subject to monitoring for waste discharge and antipollution measures . . . Environmentalists say factories that employ fewer than 50 people will be exempt from mandatory five-year licensing requirements and will escape pollution monitoring by the Department of Industrial Works.

While the revised law may cut red tape and be more business friendly, the environmentalists say the amendments open big loopholes that will foster the toxic business of waste imports, particularly of plastic, which have ballooned in Thailand since 2016. The new factory act "will increase nontransparency and corruption," said Penchom Saetang, head of Ecological Alert and Recovery-Thailand, a local green group . . .

Analysts expect over 40% of the country's 60,500 registered Thai and foreign-owned factories to benefit from the looser rules. These include the seven Thai companies that hold licenses to import electronic waste for recycling.

According to a recent study by international environmental pressure group Greenpeace, Thailand's plastic waste imports rose from around 70,000 tons in 2016 to 481,000 tons by 2018.
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Envir ... m=referral
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