Latest update April 23rd, 2024 12:59 AM
Jun 14, 2014 News
Bai Shan Lin International Forest Development Inc has submitted an application to the Environmental Protection Agency seeking environmental authorization to undertake a large scale logging and sawmill operation.
According to a public notice which was published yesterday, the company is seeking the authorization for several areas including the Left Bank Essequibo River, Right Bank Berbice River, Right Bank Essequibo River, Left Bank Corentyne River, Left Bank Lysles River, River Bank Berbice River, and Right Bank Powis River, Regions Nine and Six.
It was noted that the project would entail, felling, extractions of timber and transportation of same to a processing facility. They would also be doing grading, construction of roads, skid trails, bridges, culverts and camps with other ancillary facilities within the concession.
The EPA noted that they fully recognized that the impending works may have “significant impacts” on the environment. Thus in keeping with the environmental protections act of 1996, an “Environmental Impact Assessment” is required before any decision to approve or reject the project.
As such the EPA has said that members of the public are invited within 28 days of the notice to make written submissions to them, setting out questions and matters which they required to be answered or considered in the “Environmental Impact Assessment”.
It was stated that a summary of the project can be viewed on the EPA’s website or uplifted at the office which is located at Ganges Street, Sophia. The public would have to stand the cost of photocopying the documents.
Bai Shan Lin has been granted a forestry concession that amounts to close to one million hectares of rainforest, from which it plans to extract logs and ship them out of Guyana. The company estimates that it will make US$1,800 from each hectare of land, giving it profits totaling US$1.7 billion.
In addition, it has been granted permission to dig up a 20-kilometre stretch of river to look for gold.
Other plans include setting up what it is calling a Guyana-China Timber Industry Economic and Trading Corporation Park plus a 400-acre real estate development.
The plans were announced last year by Chu Wenze, Chairman of Bai Shan Lin, at the Second World Congress on Timber and Wood Products Trade in Taicang, China.
Those plans were announced even before Guyana knew of it. The country became aware of what was happening only when Bai Shan Lin officials visited Guyana and held discussions with President Donald Ramotar and other Government officials.
The state information agency, GINA had reported that Bai Shan Lin has been in Guyana over the past eight years with operations through the Bai Shan Lin Forest Development Inc. These include Haimorakabra Logging, Karlam South America Timbers, Wood Associated Industries, Kwebanna Wood Productions, Sherwood Forests, Bai Shan Lin Housing Construction, Mining development Inc., and Bai Shan Lin Ship Building and Heavy Industries Inc.
It has been contended that the law does not allow one logging company to take over another, unless the President so agrees.
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