The department’s director-general, Wan Abdul Latiff Wan Jaffar said the department is often labelled as a hindrance to development due to the EIA report requirement for new projects, with accusations that the approval process takes a long time.

“We have made comparisons with other countries including developed nations. The United States took 120 days (to approve their EIA reports). We take a shorter time to approve,” he told reporters here.

Wan Abdul Latiff said decisions on Schedule 1 EIA reports are issued within 25 days, and Schedule 2 reports within 60 days.

He said approvals rely on the efficiency of EIA consultants in completing the study which could take six months to a year to complete, as it is technical and scientific.

“We have ISO standards and a client charter. Checks found that these EIA consultants are telling developers that the environment department takes a long time (to approve EIA reports), when in fact, it’s their studies that are not completed,” he said.

Wan Abdul Latiff said there were currently 600 registered EIA consultants but some had been blacklisted for falsifying reports.

Meanwhile, EIA assessment division director Rohimah Ayub said they had received EIA reports that did not follow the stipulated format and lacked verification from registered consultants.

“When reviewed, we found that the consultants were not involved in the study, but their names were used. We could not review such reports and have to send them back,” she said.

The EIA is a study that identifies, predicts, evaluates, and gathers information from the relevant parties to prevent environmental issues caused by development activities and to avoid costly mistakes.