Construction is conducting environmental impact studies

The construction sector is in the lead development of environmental impact studies, presented to MiAmbiente.

According to the data of the Ministry of Environmental Protection, the construction carried out about 576 EIAs, which represents an investment of 4,785,671,332.73 dollars.

As of May 2023, MiAmbiente has processed a total of 668 studies in the Directorate for Environmental Impact Assessment. Of these, 572 were category I, 92 level II and four category III.

The construction industry is followed by mining and quarrying with 23 EIA ($23,497,458.78) and electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply with 22 ($1,148,664,159.38).

Other activities that also required studies are tourism (17) $419,732,924.20, social, community and personal services (16) $4,950,000.00; agriculture, animal husbandry, hunting and forestry (7) USD 7,200,000.00.

Also included is the production of food products and beverages (4) USD 30,045,000.00, water supply, sewerage and waste management (2) USD 310,000.00; manufacturing industries (1) $80,000.00.

According to Domiluis Domínguez, Director of the Environmental Impact Assessment, in previous years the income from the EIA for the assessment process has decreased significantly, and so has investment in the country.

“From approximately 1,000 annual studies, it was reduced to 481, increasing as we recovered from the pandemic to 1,002 EIAs to assess by 2022,” he commented.

The official added that the recovery is in the amount of the investment indicates that the figures for this year will be favorable.

Despite injecting this investment into the economy, environmental groups have expressed concern about some of these studies because of the risks they pose.