Controversy at Concord/NAWASA community meeting
St. John, Grenada. 27 June 2025 — The National Water and Sewerage Authority (NAWASA) is planning to implement its project in Concord calling it “the long-anticipated Southern St George’s Water Supply Expansion Project — a transformative initiative designed to significantly enhance water service delivery for thousands of residents, including those in the Concord community.” In an article in Caribbeanfocus.com, it states that:
“Over the past year, NAWASA has conducted multiple consultations with Concord residents to sensitise them to the project’s scope, timeline, and environmental and social impacts. As implementation draws near, NAWASA recognises the continued need for engagement and transparency. We acknowledge that residents are seeking further clarification on certain aspects of the project, and as a responsible corporate citizen, we are committed to addressing these queries in the days ahead.”
However, the community of Concord are saying that they have no previous knowledge of the project and no community consultations have been held. This project is hailed, according to the above article, as “a major milestone in Grenada’s water sector and stands as a beacon of hope and resilience, arriving at a crucial time when the island faces the growing threats of climate change… a renewed lifeline for residents and businesses, especially those within our critical tourism belt from Concord to the southern tip of the island.” It is unfortunate that this was not shared with the community most affected by the proposed works as there are extreme contradictions in what both parties are saying in relation to consultations.
NAWASA met with members of the Concord community, in relation to the proposed project, at the local church on Saturday 21st June 2025. It had been headlined as a way to create solutions and a way forward after vendors at the waterfall and the community itself had raised concerns about the project. Some of these concerns were from local people who are already suffering shortages of water for days at a time, and from vendors whose livelihoods will be curtailed at the waterfall while the work is being undertaken. The vendors voiced that some form of compensation was needed as families would be deeply affected.
The community felt that the meeting was only called as a result of their having contacted the nation’s media asking for clarity regarding the project since they claimed they had not been consulted in any way preceding the announcement for the project starting. The community also claims that funding for the project had been withdrawn in 2022 because of a study which had indicated that the project would have disastrous consequences for the waterfall as an ecotourism site; the increase in size of pipe means that much more water will be taken out of the Concord water resource and piped to the South. The community asked for reassurance that their water supply would not be affected adversely during the project while the vendors asked for some form of reimbursement for their losses, as well as reassurance that the site would not become irrelevant once the project was executed, which would mean losing their livelihoods entirely. No reassurances were forthcoming from the representatives of NAWASA while the local Parliamentary Representative for the area stated that this was in the national interest therefore sacrifices had to be made, and people were only ‘making confusion’. The community and the vendors left the meeting having had no satisfactory responses to their concerns and feeling completely unheard and dismissed.
The Environmental and Social Management Plan (ESMP) has recently surfaced and it alludes to an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA); however, if the EIA has been completed, it has not been shared to date.
Grenada has signed and ratified the Escazú Agreement which highlights the need for community voices to be heard in development projects and for documents such as ESMPs and EIAs to be shared widely with members of society, including and especially in communities such as Concord. We stand with the Concord community and hope for a more transparent process going forward.
