St. Maarten Private Eye

I am not sure how many of you read a news article coming out of St.Kitts last week, it was in the Daily Herald.
The Prime Minister there made a statement that the sugar plantations that were closed down 2 years ago will be reopened and planting will start again, this time for the production of ethanol.
The statement said that the community should ready itself for the new changes as fuel prices have become too expensive for the island.
I do hope that Flipper or Caribdude can find that article and post it on this thread. I think it is a wonderful alternative as the sugar plantations were there already for years. It is not that the land was being used for other farming on a large scale meaning it is not taking away from other forms of agriculture.
Brazil is already non-dependant on foreign oil, other island countries who have un used land can profit from ethanol production such as Haiti.
Haiti has a huge problem that with the severe poverty of the people have resulted in the poverty stricken people cutting down every tree for burning wood for cooking.
as cooking gas is not readily available in the country.
This enviro-disaster results in mud slides everytime there is a hurricane or heavy rainfall.
Remember that in the Al Gore docu-drama he showed a picture of the island of Hispanola, he showed the difference at the border between Haiti (brown and barren)and the Dominican Republic (lush green)
Now, for those of you that attended the PRIDE/Chamber of Commerce recycling presentation last October that was given by Mr. Chirauki from the ECODEC Guadeloupe company, when the question was asked about who would be buying composte if the island decides to take up recycling and composting, he answered that his company was already thinking about Haiti as this country would be needing composte when they start with sugar planting for ethanol.
I do believe that some European funding agencies have been looking into funding projects of this nature in Haiti.