By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

A senior government official yesterday said there was no obligation to require investors to alter projects based on feedback from Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) consultations.

Rochelle Newbold, director of the Department of Environmental Planning and Protection (DEPP), told Tribune Business that not every response received from the public warranted adjustments being made to the EIA or other aspects of an investment, such as its scope.

She said: “Not every issue somebody has with a project constitutes an environmental issue of concern, because some people may not want the project to go ahead.

“To be fair, there have been some projects where people have highlighted issues that were of significant environmental concern and it did result in the document being revised, and did result in the developer changing his original plan.”

Ms Newbold said and further argued that since the Environmental Planning and Protection Act came into effect there have been several occasions where projects have changed based on public feedback.

She, though, warned persons participating in public EIA consultations: “The people own the land. They plan to develop the land the way they plan to develop it, and once it will be in an environmentally sustainable way, then they can go ahead.”

Not everyone is satisfied with the level of transparency involved in such consultations. Casuarina McKinney-Lambert, the Bahamas Reef Environment Educational Foundation (BREEF) executive director, told Tribune Business there should be a central repository where all necessary EIA information can be accessed and downloaded, “not for us to be sent all over the place looking from website to website”.

Referring to the recent notification about the Carnival ‘Grand Port’ EIA consultation, Ms McKinney said persons on the Family Islands would not be able to see the notification in the newspaper in time. She added that “oftentimes” when she is working on a remote Family Island she may not have the chance to make comments on an EIA in time. Ms Newbold addressed these concerns by saying: “There are EIAs online and there are EIAs associated with websites where people can follow a particular project from start to finish, and have a comprehensive understanding.

“Under the EIA regulations, the developers are required to make available to the public documentation on what the project is doing, and in order to do that when they put that notice in the paper, the link to the document gets put in the papers such that people can go ahead and view the document. They can even download it if they want because the document that is going forward for public consultation isn’t something that is stamped, sealed and finally approved.”