Environmental and Social

Negotiations on the voluntary sale and purchase of lands for the development of the well pads are at the preliminary stages. Landowners in the proposed drilling sites who hold title over the lands identified for drilling have willingly consented to engaging in voluntary sale agreements with the Government of St. Lucia (GoSL). It is important to note that under the RESDP all land purchase transactions will be through willing seller/willing buyer agreements, only.

At present, the RESDP is seeking Requests for Proposal for the services of a firm to review and update the project’s outdated Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) and Resettlement Action Plan (RAP), both developed in 2018. On completion, the abbreviated Resettlement Action Plan, called an A-RAP, will be disclosed to the stakeholders and public for comments, adjusted accordingly and thereafter its provisions implemented on behalf of the PIU by a RAP Implementation Consultant. Recently, a request for Expressions of Interest for the services of the abovementioned RAP Implementation Consultant was advertised by the RESDP. This individual would be responsible for executing the A-RAP of the RESDP which includes stakeholder engagement and public disclosure of the A-RAP and its contents; facilitation of land acquisition, disbursements, collection of compensation assistance, and resettlement; awareness building of the grievance redress mechanism (GRM) and assistance with the filing of grievances received from PAPs.

On hiring and on approval of the A-RAP by the World Bank, the RAP Implementation Consultant will continue negotiations with landowners and complete the transactions to facilitate the sale of the lands to the GoSL, facilitate disbursement and resettlement, inter alia.