World Environment Day in TT

If all one reads is true (since I’ve not been able to visit the site itself, nor, thank goodness, witness the destruction — nor, so far as I am aware, have those responsible denied the Press reports) the land clearance was carried out in the most cruel and callous way imaginable.

We’re told that, beginning at the outer limits, the bulldozers and backhoes worked their way towards the centre, laying waste to all in their path. Terrified wildlife fled, or, left with no escape, were mown down. Hectares of land were stripped of nurturing, protective bush to clear the way for an industrial estate that, to all intents and purposes, is still on the drawing board.

On the other hand, Alcoa, despite spending who knows how much in advertising that aluminium company’s care for the environment in Brazil and Iceland, hasn’t — well, as yet — uprooted a single weed, much less toppled a tree or two. Which is not to say weeds won’t be uprooted and trees toppled if and when Alcoa are granted a CEC to clear land for a smelter.

Meanwhile back at the drawing board for the La Brea Industrial Estate. Now that the NEC has cleared the land, all the proposed plants, industries etc, have to apply for their own, individual CECs — which may, or may not meet with the EMA’s approval. Pardon my naivety, but shouldn’t they have had their CECs approved before the NEC was given permission to lay waste the land in La Brea and surrounding areas — or is the plan/project for an industrial estate in La Brea a done deal and no argument?

Which reminds me of an Environment Watch column published a year or so ago when I wrote “It looks as though things are looking up on the Environment Front, doesn’t it? At long last we have legislation to prevent pollution - or rather, to prevent any more pollution than we have already.

“And yet, in view of our past record in enforcing environmental laws, I can’t help wondering how the EMA is going to enforce the CEC rules. And now, hard upon the heels of the CEC Rules, we have the Planning and Development of Land (PADL) Bill that, if passed, not only allows Government to seize and do whatever it will with your land, but declares the decision of the Minister of Integrated Planning and Development (or whatever label may be given that Ministry in future) is final. In that case, if, by whatever means, you can persuade the Minister to look kindly on your case, you can thumb your noses at the EMA and all its CEC rules . . .”

However, on the Eve — oh well, a week or less before World Environment Day Celebrations on Tuesday the good news is that local people, and others who mourn the loss of natural vegetation, planted trees to begin the long painful process of rehabilitating the cleared land.

One wonders, were they inspired by Professor “Gus” Speth’s lecture in the Central Bank on May 16 when he urged all those present to do what they can to preserve the environment and to bring pressure to bear on Governments (especially that arch villain on the international environment scene, the Bush administration) to cease and desist from degrading the world environment?

Let us hope so. Yet while some are trying to redress the balance (and in this context, let us not forget the National Reafforestation and Watershed Rehabilitation Programme), the bush fires now reaching and roaring over the very tops of the hills of the Northern Range in suburbs around Port-of-Spain in the past few weeks are a warning to look no further than our own backyard to stop the roaring floods, the destruction that will surely follow come the rainy season.

Bush fires are man-made. What are we doing to stop them? Can anyone, anything, short of water bombers, out those fires before they destroy hectares of bush and open the way for more and more floods...? With World Environment Day in the offing, are you doing what you can to reduce, reuse and recycle?

Do you buy drinks in glass bottles that can be recycled to make more glass. Do you put penlight, and other small batteries, aside, as the EMA suggests, so they can be disposed of with no harm to the environment? The same applies — in spades — to DIY mechanics and used motor oil.

When it comes to national pride on World Environment Day, I wonder how many motorists sporting the National Flag in support of the Soca Warriors, and those wearing T shirts and backward-facing baseball caps in the national colours ever think twice before pelting sweet drink and fast food containers out of cars, or dropping them by the wayside? (I’ve seen at least one littering like that — have you?)

One hopes those fiercely nationalistic supporters of the Warriors would never, ever dream of dumping old chairs, mattresses, fridges, stoves, car bodies in ravines and streams — or does national feeling and national pride fly out the window when it’s a case of making an effort to keep TT as clean and lovely as she deserves to be on World Environment Day, 2006?

(annehilton@rave-tt.net)