EMA grants approval for Marriott resort project in Tobago

The En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA) has grant­ed a Cer­tifi­cate of En­vi­ron­men­tal Clear­ance (CEC) for the de­vel­op­ment of a Mar­riott-brand­ed ho­tel and re­sort at Rocky Point, Mt. Irvine, To­ba­go.

The ap­proval was is­sued to Su­pe­ri­or Ho­tels of Trinidad and To­ba­go Lim­it­ed un­der CEC6451/2022 for the project on ap­prox­i­mate­ly 11.99 hectares of land.

Ac­cord­ing to the EMA, the de­vel­op­ment forms part of ef­forts to sup­port in­vest­ment and eco­nom­ic ac­tiv­i­ty while main­tain­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal over­sight un­der the Au­thor­i­ty’s leg­isla­tive man­date.

The project will in­clude a 200-room ho­tel, vil­las, town­hous­es, recre­ation­al fa­cil­i­ties and green spaces. The de­vel­op­ment is aimed at in­creas­ing ac­com­mo­da­tion ca­pac­i­ty in To­ba­go and sup­port­ing in­ter­na­tion­al vis­i­tor ar­rivals.

EMA Tech­ni­cal Man­ag­er (Ag.) Sal­ly Ma­haraj said the ap­proval re­flect­ed the Au­thor­i­ty’s ap­proach to en­gage­ment with stake­hold­ers and its fo­cus on bal­anc­ing de­vel­op­ment with en­vi­ron­men­tal re­quire­ments.

“This ap­proval rep­re­sents a key strate­gic ef­fort by the EMA un­der the guid­ance of the new Board of Di­rec­tors, re­flect­ing a strength­ened, more col­lab­o­ra­tive ap­proach to en­gage­ment with stake­hold­ers. It un­der­scores our com­mit­ment to im­prov­ing the ease of do­ing busi­ness while up­hold­ing rig­or­ous en­vi­ron­men­tal stan­dards, in sup­port of sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment across Trinidad and To­ba­go,” Ma­haraj said.

The EMA stat­ed that the ap­pli­ca­tion was sub­ject­ed to an En­vi­ron­men­tal Im­pact As­sess­ment (EIA), which ex­am­ined po­ten­tial ef­fects on phys­i­cal, bi­o­log­i­cal and so­cio-eco­nom­ic en­vi­ron­ments.

The as­sess­ment process in­clud­ed pub­lic con­sul­ta­tions and dis­cus­sions with stake­hold­er groups.

Ac­cord­ing to the EMA, the re­view found that en­vi­ron­men­tal and so­cial im­pacts had been iden­ti­fied and ad­dressed through mit­i­ga­tion mea­sures in­clud­ed in the project’s de­sign.

The EMA said mea­sures will be im­ple­ment­ed to pro­tect coastal ecosys­tems, in­clud­ing coral reefs, through con­trols on ef­flu­ent dis­charge, set­backs, earth­works and waste­water man­age­ment.

Ad­di­tion­al mea­sures are ex­pect­ed to ad­dress im­pacts on sea tur­tles and nest­ing habi­tats through con­struc­tion sched­ul­ing, light­ing con­trols, beach man­age­ment and pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion pro­grammes sup­port­ed by mon­i­tor­ing sys­tems.

The EMA al­so not­ed that the ap­proved de­vel­op­ment does not in­clude coastal or ma­rine works.

The project in­cludes pro­vi­sions for drainage and wa­ter qual­i­ty man­age­ment, preser­va­tion of cul­tur­al her­itage sites such as Fort Mon­ck, and pub­lic ac­cess to the shore­line.

EMA of­fi­cials said the de­vel­op­ment is ex­pect­ed to gen­er­ate em­ploy­ment dur­ing the con­struc­tion and op­er­a­tional phas­es and in­crease de­mand for lo­cal goods and ser­vices.

Chair­man of Su­pe­ri­or Ho­tels Trinidad and To­ba­go John Aboud wel­comed the ap­proval and said the com­pa­ny ex­pe­ri­enced col­lab­o­ra­tion dur­ing the ap­pli­ca­tion process.

“We have not­ed greater col­lab­o­ra­tion, hand-hold­ing, not com­pris­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal stan­dards, but guid­ing through­out the process. We are very en­cour­aged by the EMA’s new ap­proach to the ap­provals process. As an in­vestor and de­vel­op­er, this lev­el of ef­fi­cien­cy and col­lab­o­ra­tion will go a long way in strength­en­ing in­vestor con­fi­dence and en­cour­ag­ing fur­ther de­vel­op­ment with­in Trinidad and To­ba­go,” Aboud said.

The EMA said while its as­sess­ment fo­cused on en­vi­ron­men­tal mat­ters with­in its re­mit, ap­provals from oth­er agen­cies would still be re­quired.

Those agen­cies in­clude the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning Di­vi­sion, the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty and di­vi­sions of the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly.

The EMA said the process was in­tend­ed to en­sure that de­vel­op­ment projects pro­ceed through a co­or­di­nat­ed frame­work in­volv­ing en­vi­ron­men­tal re­view and over­sight by mul­ti­ple agen­cies.