$17.2M pact signed for Beal deal cadastral survey
A local firm, Harrinandan & Associates has been hired to execute the cadastral survey to demarcate the boundaries of the land for Beal Aerospace Technologies' spaceport project in Guyana. The contract value is $17.2 million and Beal is to make a 60% advance of this sum by July 11 for the survey to get started within seven days of this date, Deochand Narain, head of the Guyana Office for Investment (Go-Invest) said yesterday. The survey is expected to be completed in 81 days, Prime Minister Sam Hinds and senior partner of Harrinandan & Associates, Devanand Harrinandan, signed the agreement to execute the survey yesterday at the Prime Minister's Office in the presence of the media. Harrinandan & Associates was one of three companies which provided estimates to Go-Invest to execute the project. The other companies were the Caribbean Engineering Management Consultancy (CEMCO) and Survey Systems. Narain said Harrinandan came in at the lowest bid and after consulting with Beal, the decision was taken to award the contract with 60% of the cost being met as an advance, 25% on evidence of completion of 75% of the work and the final 15% on acceptance of the survey documents. The cadastral survey will demarcate the legal boundaries of Beal Aerospace Technologies' local operation and will allow for the transfer of the land into the possession of Beal. This will facilitate Beal paying for the 26,010 acres of land at US$3 per acre. Narain disclosed that on June 16, Beal paid the easement fee of US$1 per acre for the 76,000 acres of land it had asked for access to. This fee is payable by February of each year but for this year, payment was made last month as the 99-year agreement with Beal was only signed in May. Harrinandan & Associates is a six-year-old company which has been involved in cadastral surveys in the interior. According to Harrinandan, such surveys were done at St Cuthbert's Mission, Warapoka, Red Hill and a number of villages in the Rupununi. Harrinandan is a qualified surveyor who worked briefly with the Lands and Surveys Department. He said persons from within the nearby villages will be used in the survey with the skills required coming from the city. Asked about the next steps, the Prime Minister said that armed with the results of the cadastral survey and legal ownership of the land (26,010 acres) and access to 76,000 acres, Beal would be in a position to do its soil surveys and to do the design layout for its proposed investment in Guyana. This would also facilitate the government's relocation plan for families living within the buffer area of the Beal project. Hinds noted that this survey will provide the precise limits and will tell the government exactly how many families will have to be moved. A relocation committee is to be set up and Hinds indicated that this process should start moving when the survey results are out. Narain indicated that Beal had to serve the government with six months notice to clear the area for it to get started on its investment. However, the Prime Minister was not in a position to comment on the interim permit application to the Environmental Protection Agency by Beal which was temporarily shelved. Hinds said he had not spoken to Beal Vice-President, David Spoede on the issue and Narain said if he commented on the subject, he would only be speculating. Spoede had indicated that the interim permit application would be put on hold but he did not indicate for how long. He said that Beal's focus was to lobby the US State Department to get the support required to have satellite technology transferred to Guyana. Without this approval, the project in Guyana could not move forward. (GITANJALI SINGH)
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