<\/p>\n
BY KEVIN GALANG<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga — The Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) Region 3 Office is conducting an investigation into complaints that a big paper mill plant had discharged polluted water into a waterway in agricultural areas of Samal, Bataan.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n EMB Region 3 director Martin Jose Despi, in text messages to reporters, said they inspected and collected samples in areas suspected to be affected by water from Bataan 2020 Inc. Paper Mill’s lagoon.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n He said ocular inspections and gathering of effluent samples were conducted last June 5 and 11, in coordination with the Samal local government. <\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Despi said they are still waiting for the result of the laboratory wastewater analysis to determine the quality of discharge.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n A source told reporters that Samal Mayor Alexander Acuzar made the initial inspection of farmland in his town on June 5 after receiving complaints from his constituents and found dark gray water in the area.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Last June 6, the mayor issued a cease-and-desist order against Bataan 2020 Inc..<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The EMB Region 3 said that Bataan 2020 halted its operation on June 8.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n A source said some 70 to 80 farmers in four villages around the Bataan 2020 plant were affected by the dark-color and smelly water coming out from the paper mill’s lagoon.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n “The water flows down the river and might even affect even the sea,” the source added.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Reporters have tried to get comments from Bataan 2020 through the company’s email and Facebook messenger but have not yet received any response as of this posting.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" BY KEVIN GALANG SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga — The Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) Region 3 Office is conducting an investigation into complaints that a big paper<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6755,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6754"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6754"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6754\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6756,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6754\/revisions\/6756"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}