Alcoa Smelter Gets Cold Shoulder in Trinidad

Alcoa Smelter Gets Cold Shoulder in Trinidad

PlanetArk

29 December 2006

PORT OF SPAIN - Residents of a remote village in Trinidad won a battle against corporate America this week when the government pulled the plug on plans by Alcoa to build a giant aluminum smelter near their homes.

Bowing to a year of stormy protests, Prime Minister Patrick Manning said the government was scrapping plans to open an industrial park in Cap-de-Ville, in a sleepy, southeast farming region where the US$1.5 billion smelter was to have been located.

Instead, the government now intends to accelerate development of a new, off-shore industrial park at Otaheite Bank, in a southern region where the proposed Alcoa smelter and other industrial plants will be located.

The battle against the world's largest aluminum producer looks set to continue, however, as fishermen and residents of Otaheite prepare to stage their own protests against the smelter, which would have a capacity to produce around 340,000 metric tons of aluminum per year.

Just like the villagers of Cap-de-Ville and adjoining Chatham, the people of Otaheite fear potential pollution and harmful emissions from the plant.

They also fear it could wreak havoc with the local fishing industry and impoverish the estimated 400 Otaheite families that depend on it for their livelihood.

"We have a consensus. We will protest," said Suresh Seepersad, a spokesman for the Otaheite Fishermen's Association.

"As fishermen and residents of the area, we will be ready to die for this cause," he said.

Ricky Undheim, vice president of the Cap De Ville/Chatham Environmental Protection Group, said protesters from the first site for the smelter would stand shoulder-to-shoulder with their counterparts in Otaheite to fight against the US aluminum giant.

"We are disappointed," Undheim said, referring to Manning's plans to relocate the smelter to Otaheite. "We will continue the struggle." he said.

Story by Linda Hutchinson-Jafar

REUTERS NEWS SERVICE