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A HIGH COURT judge has quashed the 2017 decision by the Environmental Management Authority (EMA) to approve a major Housing Development Corporation (HDC) project on lands at the St Augustine Nurseries.

Justice Robin Mohammed delivered the ruling on December 1, ending a years-long legal challenge brought in 2018 by environmental activist Dr Wayne Kublalsingh and Trinidad Unified Farmers Association president Shiraz Khan. The pair argued that the EMA granted a Certificate of Environmental Clearance (CEC) for the construction of 12 eight-storey apartment buildings – 504 units in total – on more than seven hectares of fertile agricultural land off Farm Road and the Southern Main Road, Valsayn, without requiring a full Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA).

Kublalsingh and Khan said the nurseries played a crucial role in propagating plant material for the agricultural sector and warned of long-term environmental harm if the development proceeded. In 2022, Mohammed granted them leave to pursue the judicial review claim and issued an injunction stopping the HDC from starting or continuing construction on the 17.4-acre Curepe site.