Rayong in Thai East to become "green town"

BANGKOK, November 6 (TNA) - The government, through the Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand (IEAT) and the Office of the National Economic and Social Development Board (NESDB), is implementing a plan to develop Rayong Province in the Thai East to become a “green town”. Thai Prime Minister and Defence Minister Yingluck Shinawatra visited the Map Ta Phut Industrial Estate in Rayong on Wednesday to follow up the implementation of the plan. IEAT Governor Veerapong Chaiperm briefed the Thai prime minister on the progress of the plan, covering the development of systems to prevent environmental problems and to change Map Ta Phut into an eco-industrial estate over the next six years, as well as rehabilitation for parties affected by an oil spill off Rayong's coast in late July 2013. Veerapong said as pollution affected local communities in Rayong in 2010, the IEAT has, thus, set up an information center and connected it to its headquarters in Bangkok so that it is able to deal with problems quickly. The IEAT governor acknowledged that his agency has also established a disaster prevention center together with local communities and ordered the management of all factories to work out risk management plans, maintain their facilities and conduct emergency response drills with community dwellers once a year. According to the IEAT governor, factories in the Map Ta Phut Industrial Estate are large-scaled, with a total of 138 operators who have invested about 900 billion baht in the eastern Thai industrial estate. Meanwhile, NESDB Secretary-General Arkhom Termpittayapaisith told reporters, after the Thai Cabinet resolved to address environmental problems, that concerned agencies have accelerated the plan to upgrade Rayong into a "green town". Under the initiative, similar to a Japanese move, regulations will be enforced strictly to protect the environment, while the Ministry of Interior will work out town zoning, consisting of green areas, industrial zones and community areas to serve urbanization in Rayong. Besides, concerned authorities will take good care of public health and the disposal of industrial waste. The NESDB chief noted that there have been 99 projects to have participated in solving environmental problems with a total cost of about 6.36 billion baht, 88 of which have been immediately implemented, covering, particularly, the application of overseas garbage disposal systems for the Map Ta Phut Industrial Estate to turn it into an eco-industrial estate by 2019. (TNA)