Falklands seeks TT energy expertise

Special advisers Amelia Appleby and Victoria Collier also comprised the delegation.

The delegation made this known to a panel discussion, “Reality of the Falkland Islands today”, held on Thursday by the SALISES Department of the University of the West Indies, St Augustine, chaired by acting Director, Dr Roy McCree.

The British dependency in the South Atlantic was subject to Argentine invasion in 1982, with governmental- level relations still frosty.

The Falkland Islands is a twin island territory, the size of Jamaica and with a healthy economy plus large deposits of oil and gas, but there the similarities end. Unlike TT, the Falklands has virtually no crime and no unemployment, even as it needs to increase its population gradually.

Already, amongst the territory’s minuscule population of 3,000 persons in the remote and windswept territory, one TT national, Christine Ramoutar, is already running Falkland Radio.

Hansen said the Falklands as a new arrival in the energy-sector has chosen to seek help from TT so as to benefit from this country’s decades of experience.

He said a TT energy sector delegation had once visited the Falklands at Hansen’s invitation.

On his visit to TT, Hansen has signed an MOU with Kenson’s for the training of Falkland Islands youngsters in the energy industry.

He said that for domestic consumption the Falklands is very much into renewable energy including wind turbines which supply 40 percent of Port Stanley’s energy- needs, and is now looking at solar power.

Hansen noted that the Falkland Islands Legislature aims that oil drilled offshore will be transported away, and not be brought ashore for any refining which he said could pose a threat to the pristine ecology which is itself a valuable source of eco-tourism.

Otherwise he said the Falklands economy relies on the grant of fisheries licences to foreign interests, plus the rearing of sheep and cows.