Subject: [cwj 11] Environmentalists in Korea, Japan call for halt to Saemangum project
From: Corporate Watch in Japanese <cwj@corpwatch.org>
Date: Tue, 09 May 2000 14:27:51 -0700
Seq: 11
Korea Herald 05/09/2000 Environmentalists in Korea, Japan call for halt to Saemangum project Environmental groups in Korea and Japan urged the Korean government yesterday to immediately end a reclamation project in North Cholla Province, saying the nation risks losing one of the world's most precious tidal flats. The Korean Federation for Environmental Movement (KFEM), the nation's largest environmental group, and the Japan Wetlands Action Network (JAWAN) issued a joint declaration calling on the government to halt the Saemangum Reclamation Project. In the declaration, the two groups characterized the project, which is aimed at reclaiming about 40,000 ha of mud flats on the northwestern coast of the province, as the world's "most destructive reclamation project." They also said a weeklong joint survey had shown that the region's mud flat is one of the most valuable tidal flat ecosystems in the world. "The government has been saying that the project would increase the nation's farmlands, help secure water resources and prevent flooding," the declaration read. "However, Japan's largest-ever reclamation project, in Isahaya Bay, shows that they are wrong." Hirofumi Yamashita, co-head of JAWAN, said that despite the Japanese government's claim that the Isahaya Bay Reclamation Project, which turned about 3,500 ha of tidal flats into farmland, would also help prevent flooding, 90 percent of Isahaya residents had to evacuate the area last year due to a large-scale flood. "The flood damage increased because the government failed to inform Isahaya residents that floodwaters would flow to farmlands if the Isahaya sluice gates were kept closed during a flood at a full tide," Yamashita said. Choi Yul, head of the KFEM, said that if the Saemangum project goes ahead, the reclaimed area would be just as susceptible as Isahaya to flooding at high tide. Choi also accused the Saemangum project operator, the Korea Agricultural & Rural Infrastructure Corporation (KARIC), of being ignorant of the ecosystem of tidal flats. "KARIC's publicity booklets say that mud flats continued to form in Isahaya after the reclamation project," Choi said. "This is totally wrong. It is only hundreds of years after a reclamation project that stable tidal flats can be expected to form." Calling on the Korean government to abide by an international resolution adopted last year at a Ramsar Convention on wetlands protection, the two environmental groups pledged to work closely to derail the Saemangum project and open the sluice gates at Isahaya Bay. Updated: 05/09/2000 by Chang Jae-soon Staff reporter ______________________ The Corporate Watch in Japanese http://www.corpwatch.org/japan (CWJ) mailing list is a moderated email list in English designed to connect activists campaigning against Japanese corporations and investments around the world. * To unsubscribe from the CWJ mailing list, send an email to majordomo@jca.apc.org with text "unsubscribe cwj". To subscribe to the CWJ mailing list, send a message to majordomo@jca.apc.org with the text "subscribe cwj" * The CWJ mailing list is NOT intended for wide distribution. If you would like to post messages from this list somewhere else, we ask that you first contact us at cwj@corpwatch.org ______________________