Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar has condemned the issuing of a permit legalising the cement silo built adjacent to the Kordin Grain Silo.

This Cement Silo was built without any permits, however when alerted to this, the planning authority refused to step in and stop the abusive construction, the organisation said.

To make matters worse, it granted a temporary operating permit, claiming this was necessary to carry out a risk assessment, when such an assessment should have be carried out before a project begun.

The risk assessments ordered by the Environmental Health Directorate highlighted the serious risk of contamination of the grain by cement dust.

It concluded that "it is unlikely that this silo operation will be completely free from all fugitive emissions and so the possibility that the grain being handled nearby will be subject to a level of contamination from cement dust remains present even following the application of best practices".

The report conceded that cement dust would remain in the atmosphere and could be carried up to 100m, when the grain silo was just five metres away.

Mepa, the FAA said, issued the permit subject to a number of stringent regulations which were subject to human error, while knowing that it did not have the resources to properly monitor the conditions imposed.

FAA said that besides importing for local consumption, Kordin Grain Terminal also stored up to €30 million worth of grain for foreign clients who already indicated they would be reviewing the situation if the cement silo remained on site.

This not only puts in jeopardy the taxpayer’s €30 million investment, but also the jobs of the terminal employees.

FAA said that the most worrying factor was the cost to public health, especially since this grain silo supplied the wheat for 70 per cent of Malta’s bread.

The organisation said it failed to understand how some Mepa board members could have voted in favour of the permit, knowing that they could be endangering children’s health.

Through this decision, the new board lost any credibility it might have had, showing that it lacked the courage to see through its responsibilities and sinking to new depths of lack of ethics, FAA said.