On Thursday, at the Ministry of the Environment, a meeting was held on the theme of the "Problem of the exploitation of quarries of rocks and aggregates in Haiti". Have participated to these exchanges Pierre Simon Georges Minister of Environment, Ronsard St Cyr, the Secretary of State for Public Security, geological engineer Claude Prépetit, Director of the Bureau of Mines and Energy (BME) and executives of the Ministry of Public Works and Environment.

Giving an urgent response to the problem of excessive exploitation of quarries of rocks and aggregates through the metropolitan area particularly Morne Cabrit and Laboule, was the backdrop to this important meeting which was chaired by the holder of the Minister of the Environment.

In his speech, Claude Préptit presented an overwhelming report concerning the excessive exploitation of quarries across the country and the metropolitan area in particular. According to this report, on 140 quarries listed in the Department of the West https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-22394-haiti-news-zapping.html 89% of operators are illegal and have no state operating licenses. While recognizing the importance of the "Buildings and Public Works" sector for any country, Claude Préptit insists on the need to regulate and control it through a national policy on the exploitation, transport and marketing of quarry materials in order to to reconcile the development of this sector, the preservation of the environment and the rational management of natural resources in the country.

Minister St. Cyr emphasized the importance of acting in synergy, stressing that this problem must be tackled through a common front of state actors. He announced that he would submit this dossier to the Council of Ministers in the coming days, in order to mobilize the Government to take measures to curb these abuses.

The geologist engineer Claude Prépetit made several recommendations including :

• Define Authorized Operating Zones and Unauthorized Zones ;

• Define procedures for the granting of operating permits ;

• Define the quality of the materials and the treatment methods in the authorized zones ;

• Define modes of transport, storage of materials and movement of carriers ;

• Define a system of taxation, methods of collection and marketing of materials ;

• Define environmental regulations and procedures for the rehabilitation of quarries.

These recommendations provided an opportunity to set out the responsibilities of each institution in this regard, all of which were in favor of government ownership in the context of strengthening management and protecting the environment.

HL/ TB/ HaitiLibre