The CDS-PP deputies want the Government to guarantee continuous monitoring of air quality in the municipalities of Ferreira do Alentejo and Alvito, because of complaints from the population related to the production of olive pomace.
In the Draft Resolution that was entered yesterday in the Assembly of the Republic, the centrist deputies want the Government to “guarantee the installation of systems for continuous monitoring of the air quality at the exit of the chimneys of the olive pomace factories, in the municipalities of Ferreira Alentejo and Alvito', as well as 'evaluate, periodically, the air quality of the affected localities'.
Last May, at least seven dozen complaints were filed with the Public Ministry (MP) against a factory that the inhabitants of the village of forte, in the municipality of Ferreira do Alentejo, accuse of polluting the air and causing health problems.
The target is AZPO – Azeites de Portugal, an olive pomace oil extraction factory located near the small village of Fortes.
In the same month of May, an article in the newspaper «Público» reported the testimony of Joaquim Barrocas, resident of forts, who described the daily life of those who live half-walled with the olive pomace treatment unit: «the day-to-day has become unbearable. There are people with respiratory problems and eye irritation. Houses and vehicles are covered with oily residue and ash and clothes cannot be laid out, because it smells bad”.
The company, revealed the «Público», countered that only water vapor comes out of the chimneys and that progress has this type of cost.
It is true that, even without living in the village of Fortes, it is possible to see that, from the chimneys, something more than water vapor comes out. Passengers on the A2 highway can smell the smell for miles, as well as see the cloud of steam that forms.
For all this, the CDS deputies also want the Government to “promote an epidemiological study in order to assess whether the populations surrounding the olive pomace factories, in the municipalities of Ferreira do Alentejo and Alvito, suffer from some pathologies, namely which may be attributable to air quality'.
Another measure is the evaluation of the “licenses granted”, to find out whether they “are in accordance with the working conditions, establishing, if necessary, a transitional period for their adaptation to the new rules that have been stipulated”.
On the other hand, the centrists' Resolution Project demands that the Government “promote ways to support the essential conversion of the Fortes factory unit, establishing deadlines and commitments that involve all stakeholders: population, companies, municipalities and central administration”.
The parliamentarians called for the region's Universities and Polytechnics to be involved "as privileged partners both in diagnosing and solving these problems, as well as in their subsequent monitoring".
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