1. L/O/G/O
Strengthening the Right to Information to Improve Public
Health and Environmental Quality: STRIPE
THAILAND Findings on Access to
Environmental Information
Regional Meeting: April 29 – May 1, 2013
Jakarta, Indonesia
Somrudee Nicro, Ph.D.

2. Contents
Access to Water Pollution Info4
Introduction to Map Ta Phut1
Assessment of the Official Information Act (OIA) 19972
Access to Air Pollution Info3

3. http www beachthailand com thailand-maps
http www pattayadailynews com en 2009/09/30/76-new-maptaphut-industrial-projects-halted-by-court-injunction
Map Ta Phut Municipality
Rayong Province, Thailand

4. Map Ta Phut
http www .mtp.rmutt.ac.th/?page_id=62
33 communities
Population: 45,646 people (2008)
Area: 144.575 km2
Map Ta Phut Complex:
 Map Ta Phut Industrial Estate
 Hemaraj Eastern Industrial Estate
 Padaeng Industrial Estate
 Asia Industrial Estate
 IRL Industrial Estate
 Map Ta Phut Industrial Port

5. Environmental Impacts

6. Air Pollution

7. Source: Eastern People Network
Coastal Erosion

8. Water Pollution
Source: Eastern People Network

9. Soil
Soil

10. Health impactsHealth Impacts
Source: Eastern People Network

11. Air pollution during 1996-97 caused Maptaput Panpittayakarn School to move to a
new location

12. Assessment of
the Official Information Act
(1997)

13. Constraints / Problems
Official Information Act (OIA)
Officials avoid exercising their judgment whether
or not to disclose information
No instruments or rules put in place for officials
to exercise judgment and thereby ensure safety for
the official courageous enough to disclose the
information.
Section 9(8) of the OIA
Govt. agencies often do not understand whether
the information in their possession are under the
scope of Section 9(8).
Assessment of the OIA

14. Constraints / Problems
Regarding Organizational
Structure
•OOIC is under the PM Office, not
independent.
•Large composition of the Official
Information Board
•OOIC is centralized.
Regarding the public
•Don’t understand the law
•Empathy in exercising their rights
Regarding the Law itself
•Difficult to understand
•Don’t protect officials who disclose the
information
Regarding the Government
•Govt. has no enforcement measures.
•Govt’s fear of more people wanting to
exercise their rights
Implementation
/ Compliance
Assessment of the OIA

15. Recommendations
Short-term Actions
• Govt. needs to set clear policy
on enforcement of the OIA.
• Provincial authorities should have
the duty to disseminate and
publicize the Act in their provinces.
• Govt. agencies should reconsider
fees for photocopying document
and verification of the photocopied
document.
Long-term Actions
•Govt. must instruct every govt.
agency to publicize the Act seriously
and continuously.
•Change officials' attitude to be
service-minded
•Revise the OIC's structure and
improve its competency
•Develop standards and good
information management system for
govt. agencies
•A Personal Information Act with clear
purposes and procedures should be
developed.
Assessment of the OIA

16. AIR QUALITY INFO
Access to

17. Access to Information
Findings
Oral request can’t be used as an evidence to lodge an
appeal.
Requestors need to know first the scope of duties and authority of
govt. agency.
Having requestors photocopy document by themselves implies that
the govt. agencies denying the request.
Govt. agencies have a concern about the requester’s objectives for
fear that it may violate public right under Article 56 and 57 of the 2007
Constitution.
Requestors do not submit appeal as they do not know the
requesting process.
Assessment of Air quality pollution control

18. Access to Information
Objectives for the request may not be locally driven
Insufficient knowledge about the requested
information
Incurred expenses
Different interpretations of agencies in enforcing
Section 9(8)
Assessment of Air quality pollution control

19. Recommendations
Assessment of Air quality pollution control
Allocate a budget for each govt. agency to facilitate
public access to information
Develop a public satisfaction indicators/index to
measure people’s satisfaction
Penalize officials who neglect the request
Agencies, e.g. ONEP, need to reconsider their fees
currently required for document photocopying and
verification.

20. Recommendations
Assessment of Air quality pollution control
Require project proponents to also submit info to
ONEP in digital forms
Acknowledge digital requests and info as official.
All decisions made by Official Information
Commission (OIC) should be categorized and
disseminated on OOIC’s website.
In view of AEC, OOIC should propose the
improvement of the law on access to information by
aliens

21. Access to Water Quality Info

22. Access to Information
Time taken to obtain the information exceeds that
prescribed by the law.
Water monitoring covers not all parameters of water quality
Suspicion among community members whether the
discharged water sample was replaced or modified
The public or local stakeholders have no access to the info
on monitoring results.
Requester received average water quality info, not the info
of the specific dates they requested.
When water quality was found to be poorer than standard,
no actions were taken against the polluters (facilities or
communities) or responsible agencies .
Assessment of Water quality pollution control

23. Access to Information
Constraints / Problems
 Several laws related to water quality are difficult to understand
 Officials collect water samples during office hours. But facilities
discharge pollutants during the nights or heavy rainfalls.
 Information received from govt. agency does not correspond with the
requests, thus wasting time on both sides.
 Officials who take more than 15 days (as required by law) to
respond to a request faces no penalty.
 Official response is written by legal officials. Some of them may
not understand the reasons for denying the request. Also shortage
of legal officials.
Assessment of Water quality pollution control

24. Recommendations
Recommendations (cont.)
Integrate all laws on water quality into a legal code.
Restructure the role and authority of agency responsible for water quality
monitoring so that it can impose immediate punitive measures (~US EPA)
Provide communities trainings on laws pertaining to public rights to
get access to each type of information
Require every govt. agency to disclose and disseminate information on
its website, and monitored by OOIC
Assessment of Water quality pollution control

25. Recommendations
Recommendations
OOIC should compile decisions made by the Information Disclosure
Tribunals which demands govt. agencies to disclose information on
water quality, and categorize and disseminate them to the public.
OOIC should compile cases that the Tribunals decided not to have the
requested info disclosed and submit them to OIC for review and
setting guidelines or standard.
Each agency should develop an info system, including index, and
make it easily accessible to the public so community members know
where to go for the info they seek.
Assessment of Water quality pollution control

26. L/O/G/O
Thank You!