MEPA issues permit for large fireworks factory extension

A new planning policy allowing fireworks factories to expand in the countryside, approved in 2014, has yielded its first environmental casualty: a large tract of land outside development zones in Luqa known as Ta’ Hal Salfieni.

The massive extension over 11598 square meters of land was not approved by MEPA's board which is always in the media spot light as happens in the case of large scale projects in the ODZ, but by the Environment Planning Commissions.

The land in question was designated as a strategic open gap in the South Malta Local Plan where no development which leads to “the expansion or intensification of already permitted developments” or which results in urban sprawl, can be allowed.

The development was the first to be approved by an ad hoc technical committee appointed by former junior minister Michael Falzon. Falzon, himself a fireworks enthusiast, had chaired the committee which drafted the planning policy facilitating the development of fireworks factories outside the development boundaries (ODZ).

MEPA’s Environment Planning Commission, which issued the permit on Wednesday, ignored the advice given by the Natural Heritage Advisory Committee and the Environment Protection Directorate, both of which had warned against the take-up of ODZ land.   

The EPD had specifically recommended that any development should be limited to the southern part of this site but the case officer insisted that the layout of the factory had to follow the technical guidelines issued by the ad hoc committee. 

The licensed fireworks factory is located on a large 11,598 sq.m ODZ tract of land which is described as “underutilized” in the planning application submitted by the fireworks enthusiasts.

The complex, located in an area known as Ta’ Hal Salfieni, is partly covered by a planning permit issued in 1973. The proposed complex will now consist of 26 rooms. 

The proposal involves the construction of six main stores, a reservoir, new storage and processing rooms, blast walls with sand bags, the installation of a new firefighting system, the construction of a chain link fence, the re-levelling of the site to ensure better access, the removal of “inappropriate” trees and the planting of new ones and the sanctioning of a number of pre-1967 structures. 

Din l-Art Helwa was particularly concerned by fireworks activities sprawling from the area presently impacted by the development.  

“It is a pity that the development is not consolidated in the area which is already developed in order to reduce the spread in the ODZ,” it said.

Other objections have been registered by residents and farmers who lamented that the extension will bring the factory even closer to them. 

“We have been suffering from fire in our fields during these past years caused by pieces of fireworks falling on our soil. With this extension the factory will be even closer to us… so please keep the danger away from our fields and ourselves,” a farmer wrote in a letter sent to MEPA. A number of residents living in the vicinity of the present factory also expressed concern that the extension will mean that the danger will be closer to them.