Some farmers involved in action against a battery factory that
they believe has poisoned their children with lead responded
positively to a local government pledge yesterday to resolve the
dispute.
"I trust that things will be settled on an equal footing," Hu
Fengqiang, a 40-year-old farmer from Qiuwu Village, was quoted by
China Daily yesterday in a report that said life for most
villagers was now back to normal after a weeklong protest.
He said they were waiting for results from final environmental
tests to see whether or not the plant is affecting the surrounding
environment.
His 14-year-old son was one of over 750 children from Meishan
Town, Changxing County in the eastern province of Zhejiang
found to have blood lead levels thought to be a cause for concern,
out of 1,300 tested there in May.
Hu Yili, vice-director of Changxing Health Bureau, said there
was no national standard for blood lead levels in China, so 100
micrograms of lead per liter of blood, as used by the US Center of
Disease Control and Prevention, was used as a threshold.
According to the WHO, even these amounts, once thought to be
safe, may lead to decreased intelligence in children, behavioral
difficulties and learning problems, and subtle effects on IQ loss
are expected from levels as low as 50 micrograms per liter of
blood.
At least 71 of the children tested in Meishan had more than 250
micrograms of lead per liter of blood and required medical
treatment.
Hu Yili stressed that none of this necessarily meant they were
poisoned by lead from Tian Neng Battery Company, though waste
disposed by it is widely suspected to be the cause. The plant is
around 600 meters from nine villages.
Chen Yan, director of Changxing Environmental Protection Bureau,
said its most recent check on the factory in October 2004 found its
waste met national requirements, and that the cause of the
poisoning should be identified in one or two months' time.
Zhang Quanzhen, committee chairman of Changxing's Chinese
People's Political Consultative Conference, said an investigation
team from the provincial environmental protection bureau has
arrived in Meishan to collect air, earth and water samples,
assisted by volunteer farmers.
Teams of officials have also gone door to door around the
villages telling people that the government will settle the dispute
in accordance with the law, Zhang added.
"The government is responsible for checking out the causes, and
all medical fees of victims will be covered by the local
government. The government supports farmers in lodging their
complaints through legal means," Zhang told China Daily
yesterday.
Local farmers piled cement slabs at the plant's gate, stopping
operations for seven days, and there were confrontations between
them and factory employees. Over 500 people threw stones and
fought, local police were sent to keep the peace and two police
vehicles were burned.
At 8 PM that day, a group broke into the factory and set fire to
it, causing losses of 5 million yuan (US$616,500).
(China Daily August 25, 2005)