The cement factory and Fuheis

As far back as I can remember, the residents of Fuheis have been complaining about the environmental impact of the cement factory which was shortsightedly placed in their town in 1951. At the time, the area was somewhat secluded, and many of the raw materials needed for the production of cement were close by. Moreover, people were not aware of the environmental consequences of having such a facility nearby.

As it happens, Fuheis lies in a beautifully forested area to the west of Amman. The area is ideal as a resort area in a country which treasures green spaces. Residents complain of noise, traffic and mostly dust emanating from the factory.

A French company (LaFarge) purchased controlling shares of the Jordan Cement Factories Company (JCFC) from the government in 1998. It was naively hoped at the time that the company would deal with the community and the environment according to standards acceptable in France. During the period of government control, promises to upgrade environmental protection measures were constantly repeated. In 1998, factory officials declared "The [environmental] plan now fully meets the international standards". After LaFarge took over, the new administration (in 2004) announced the installation of new filters which were supposed to "reduce the dust generated from 100 to 30 milligrammes per cubic metre of cement produced", which is "more than the international standards stipulate". Now the government has temporarily shut down one of the production lines at the factory, because dust emissions from the plant still violate Jordanian standards. The factory is again promising to upgrade filtering quality at the plant.

For their part, the residents of Fuheis are bent on making life as difficult as possible for the factory. A few years ago, they led a drive to prevent the company from replacing its fuel source. The company had wanted to replace the heavy fuel oil that it uses with petcoke, which is much cheaper. The government and the factory argued for the environmental safety of petcoke, but the lobbying of the residents led the king to insist on a comprehensive study the environmental impacts of the new fuel. The results led the government to drop the plan and ban the use of petcoke.

More recently, the factory is experimenting with the use of oil shale as an alternate source of fuel. Again, the residents are lobbying against this experimentation.

Given the history, it is hard not to conclude that the successive administrations of the JCFC have been dealing in bad faith with the residents of Fuheis. This has led to distrust and bad feelings. Despite financial compensation to the municipality that followed threatened legal action, trust is still missing. It is clear that it would be difficult to convince the people of Fuheis of the desire or the ability of the JCFC to eliminate the damage that it is doing to the local environment. Without concrete results, it seems difficult to imagine normal relations between the two sides.