ASEAN signs world first environmental agreement

ASEAN signs world first environmental agreement

Julia Yeow, Agence France-Presse, Kuala Lumpur

Southeast Asia claimed an environmental world first on Monday,
signing a regional agreement to tackle costly cross-border
pollution caused by land and forest fires.

Environment ministers from the 10-member Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) inked the treaty on
"transboundary haze pollution" at a ceremony in the Malaysian
capital Kuala Lumpur.

It binds member states to cooperating in preventing haze by
controlling fires, establishing early warning systems, exchanging
information and technology and providing mutual assistance.

The agreement is part of a Regional Haze Action Plan adopted
by ASEAN after serious smoke pollution in 1997 and 1998 cost some
US$9 billion in economic losses in areas including agricultural
production and tourism.

"The ASEAN agreement is the first such regional arrangement in
the world which binds a group of contiguous states to tackle land
and forest fires and its resultant transboundary haze pollution,"
the group said in a statement.

ASEAN secretary general Rodolfo Severino said the agreement
signaled a major step forward in acknowledging the importance of
regional cooperation in coping with the fire hazards.

"ASEAN considers this event as extremely important. It is one
of ASEAN's most significant agreements," he said in an opening
address to a World Conference and Exhibition on Land and Forest
Fire Hazards here.

Severino said the agreement mapped out obligations over
monitoring and coordinating action and outlined procedures for
transport of personnel and materials in response to forest fires.

The agreement also provides for the establishment of an ASEAN
Coordinating Center for Transboundary Haze Pollution Control.

However, terms of the document can only be enforced 60 days
after being ratified by six eligible signatories, with no time
frame or penalties for the failure to adhere to the terms.

"The signatories have a common interest, that is they all have
a joint interest in complying with the rules stated in the
agreement," Severino told reporters after the signing.

"There is no punitive rule, because the underlying factor in
this agreement is the common interest of all the ASEAN members."

The director of Malaysia's Department of Environment, Rosnani
Ibrahim, told AFP ASEAN member countries had "different levels of
readiness" and needed to develop their own regulations on open
burning and other pollution-related problems before being able to
ratify the agreement.

"Right now what is important is to enhance capacity of the
member countries because nothing can be done unless the parties
in the agreement are sufficiently equipped to act."

Countries such as Indonesia faced problems including a lack of
manpower and financial resources, she said.

"I can understand the situation in Indonesia, they need more
time to work on it."

Legal research ahead of the agreement was carried out by the
Indonesian Center for Environmental Law, with assistance from the
United Nations Environment Program and the Asian Development
Bank.

The 1997-98 pollution was caused by fires in Indonesia, many
of them deliberately set by planters clearing land for
cultivation.

ASEAN environment ministers or their representatives were due
to hold closed door discussions Tuesday to discuss a mechanism
for implementing the haze agreement.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.