The Prime Minister’s Office has received calls from persons who are eager to start major investment projects in Barbados, and the Town and Country Development Planning Office and the PMO Planning Unit are working assiduously to have the matters addressed. (Stock Photo)
Several investors who are keen to commence their large-scale development projects have reached out to Government to have them fast-tracked through the Town Planning Department and Prime Minister’s Office Planning Unit.
Permanent Secretary in the Prime Minister’s Office, Alies Jordan, said the response to Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley’s recent call for businesspeople to contact her office to have the processing of these major development projects expedited has been heartening.
Ms. Jordan continued: “We have received several calls from persons who are eager to start major investment projects, and the Town and Country Development Planning Office and the Planning Unit in this office are working assiduously to have the matters addressed. I want to thank all the officers working round-the-clock to expedite the processing of these applications.”
During her recent address to the nation, Ms. Mottley encouraged persons with projects and financing, who were awaiting planning approvals, to immediately contact the Prime Minister’s Office.
She had said then that this push to start projects was being undertaken to stimulate the economy in a post COVID-19 environment, after the country had been on shutdown for about five weeks, to reduce the spread of the virus.
The Permanent Secretary reported that both the Town Planning department and the PMO Planning Unit were currently processing applications for various projects across several categories.
She explained that they included submissions for hotel and resort development; villas; town houses; apartments; renewable energy, namely installation of solar voltaic systems, a renewable energy biomass project and wind turbines; along with the usual complement of householder applications.
“The proposed locations are across the island – on the west, south and southeast coastal areas,” she stated.
Ms. Jordan highlighted the redevelopment of the existing Blue Horizon Hotel property, at Rockley, Christ Church, and Royalton Barbados at the Discovery Bay site in Holetown, St. James, as two of the proposed hotel projects.
Meanwhile, there will be a first-of-its-kind virtual town hall meeting on Monday, May 18, regarding the proposed construction of the Royalton Barbados Resort.
Members of the public may also submit comments on the proposed development to the Prime Minister’s Office Planning Unit, by Wednesday, May 27.
They may be emailed to planningunit@pmo.gov.bb, or delivered to: Prime Minister’s Office Planning Unit, First Floor, Old Town Hall Building, Cheapside, Bridgetown, BB11142.
