How to understand the Buyat Bay controversy

How to understand the Buyat Bay controversy
JP/7/NEW

Understanding the Buyat Bay controversy

Siegfried Lesiasel
Jakarta

The Indonesian public is understandably confused over the
controversy surrounding Buyat Bay.

On one hand we have the Technical Team and environmental
activists claiming that the bay is polluted. On the other hand we
have venerable institutions such as the Sam Ratulangi University
(UNSRAT), Manado University, the North Sulawesi Provincial
Government, the Ministry of Energy and Mines, and Newmont itself
saying that there is no pollution.

The controversy has degenerated into an orgy of claim and
counter claim, and what seems to be complicated science beyond
the understanding of most Indonesians. This is an unnecessary
condition because the matter could be resolved easily by asking a
simple but fundamental question: what constitutes pollution?

The answer to this question is very clear in Indonesia's
Environmental Law. It says a place is considered polluted if its
function and use has been intrinsically changed by a particular
activity, which, in Buyat's case is mining by PT Newmont Minahasa
Raya.

Consider then, what are the possible functions and uses of
Buyat Bay. One of its main functions and uses is to provide food
for humans in the form of fish. It follows that there would be
pollution if the fish caught in Buyat Bay became unsafe to
consume.

This, however, is not the case. Study after study, including
that of the Technical Team itself, have shown that levels of
heavy metals -- including mercury and arsenic -- are below World
Health Organization (WHO) and Indonesian standards. In fact, the
levels of heavy metals in Buyat Bay fish are no different from
fish caught anywhere else, either in Indonesia or the rest of the
world.

It is therefore clear that in this particular function and use
-- as a human food source -- there is no pollution in Buyat Bay.

The other function and use of a coastal maritime area is to
provide a healthy environment where nature can sustain and
replenish itself, and this is where the controversy hots up.

The Technical Team and certain environmentalists claim that
the bay is polluted because sediments contain elevated levels of
arsenic as a result of tailings that Newmont dumps onto the
seabed. The opposite camp says that the elevated levels do not
constitute pollution. Who are we to believe?

Again, it is useful to go back to the fundamental definition
of pollution if we are to properly understand this issue. The
question is whether elevated levels of arsenic intrinsically
change the function and use of the bay.

The function and use would be intrinsically changed if the
elevated levels of arsenic posed a danger of contaminating fish
life, meaning that the water and the fish would have to show
higher than permitted levels of arsenic.

But this is not so. The Technical Team's own data confirms
this. So how can you have elevated arsenic levels on the seabed
and yet not have pollution?

The answer to this requires an understanding that arsenic
comes in several forms, not all of which are dangerous to human
beings. The form of arsenic on the seabed of Buyat Bay is
biologically inert and just sits there in the bottom of the ocean
doing nothing and posing no harm to any creature above or below
sea level.

Some environmentalists argue that the practice of placing
tailings on the seabed affects the function and use of Buyat Bay
because it covers the bottom of the sea and affects biodiversity.
This is true, but misleading, and is akin to saying that a
forest's function and use has been changed because five trees
have been felled for timber. Felling five trees has an impact,
but the impact is too small to change the function and use of the
forest. It is also reversible -- the trees will grow again given
time.

Similarly in Buyat, the area covered by the tailings does not
affect the function and use of the bay and is reversible by
nature. This was expected in Newmont's AMDAL that predicted that
the condition of the bay's seabed would be restored within three
years of the mine's closure.

It seems very clear that if we ask the fundamental question of
"What constitutes pollution?" and apply it to Buyat Bay, the
answer can only be that there is no pollution.

So why are certain environmentalists still so dead set on
insisting that there is pollution in Buyat Bay? It seems to me
that this country is being taken hostage by puritanical
environmental activists.

They are puritanical in the sense that they want nature to be
totally pure and untouched, to the extent that they refuse to
acknowledge that life is a series of trade-offs. All of us would
love to see nature untouched, but that is a Utopian dream.

The reality is that we need to exploit the land for resources
to feed our nation and to help our economy grow. Mining is one
such activity that does this. Mines provide jobs to thousands of
Indonesians and millions of dollars for our economy. The more
responsible mining companies also help local residents to build
economically and socially sustainable communities for the day
when the ores are exhausted and the mine has to close.

Mines, by their very nature, make an impact on the
environment. There is no escaping that fact. But the important
factor here is whether this impact is minimal and temporary, or
whether it pollutes the environment. In its wisdom the Indonesian
Government has defined pollution as intrinsically changing the
function and use of an area. This is a good definition and one
that should be applied when we are trying to decipher the
arguments surrounding the Buyat Bay controversy.

The writer is a consultant in environmental affairs. He can be
reached at fountain@cbn.net.id