Environmental audit planned by Freeport
JAKARTA (JP): PT Freeport Indonesia says its voluntary environmental audit is not a response to recent criticism.
Hoediatmo Hoed, president of mining company, which is located in Tembagapura, southern Irian Jaya, said yesterday the audit to be conducted at the end of this month has not been motivated by pressures from outside.
"We volunteer ourselves to conduct the audit although State Minister of Environment Sarwono Kusumaatmadja has also suggested to us that we do it," he said.
Siegfried Lesiasel, a staff member of PT Freeport Indonesia's Environmental and Public Affairs department, said the audit will cover the mining operations, supporting mining operations, environmental management and the socio-economic impact.
Hoediatmo said the company had started its initial environmental impact analyses in 1984, two years before the House of Representatives passed the law regulating environmental matters.
He also said that this month's audit is not a response to the lawsuit filed by the Indonesian Forum for Environment (Walhi) in May against the government for approving PT Freeport Indonesia's environmental management plan.
Walhi is suing the Ministry of Mines and Energy at the Jakarta State Administrative Court for giving the green light for PT Freeport Indonesia's activities without consulting the ministry's own Board of Environmental Impact.
Walhi, which has a non-permanent seat on that board, felt that the government-approved measures for PT Freeport Indonesia's huge mining operation in Irian Jaya were not stringent enough.
Hoediatmo charged yesterday that "some people in Walhi might be against the good relationship now developed between PT Freeport Indonesia and that forum."
Walhi also objected to an advertisement placed by PT Freeport Indonesia in Jakarta newspapers recently in which the company informed the public about the dumping of tailings (ground natural rocks from which copper, gold and silver minerals have been removed) into the Ajkwa River, which is located not far from the mines.
Walhi says the tailings are poisonous and have polluted the river.
Hoediatmo said that the advertisement was based on reality.
Wisnu Susetyo, Head of PT Freeport Indonesia's Environmental Laboratory, said that the advertisement did not claim that the tailings did not affect the Ajkwa River.
"It explained the definition of tailings and our system of management and monitoring," he added.
Bruce E. Marsh, senior manager of environmental affairs for PT Freeport Indonesia, said the tailings had resulted in sedimentation in the area close to Timika town.
"The deposition area, which is about seven kilometers southeast from Timika, is not dangerous for local people," he added.
Marsh said the migration of the people, who used to live near the tailings deposition area, was not caused by the tailings, but by their nomadic traditions. (05)