Environment

“[…] How many more accidents must occur due to defective tires, missing lights, or overloaded trucks before enforcement is taken seriously? “[…] Many trucks spew toxic emissions unchecked, while traffic police turn a blind eye. The Demerit System should include emissions violations, penalising offenders as it does for tinted windows. …

“[…] Public figures—especially elected officials—have enormous influence. Their actions speak louder than their speeches. “When they film themselves while driving, they send a dangerous message to their followers, especially impressionable youth: that risk-taking and rule-breaking are acceptable if you’re important or influential…” The following Letter to the Editor which criticises …

“[…] The focus on who gets a pass is a distraction from the fact that for the past 15 years, the journey itself has become a daily punishment for law-abiding, tax-paying citizens. “[…] On a Wednesday morning during the school term, attempt the commute to your Port of Spain ministry …

Perhaps the most surprising element of the general elections was the low voter turnout. According to the latest figures from the Election and Boundaries Commission, only 53.92% of eligible voters turned up at the polls. It is reported to be the second lowest in our history. Given the high-pitched nature …

“[…] I stand here not just for myself, but for every young professional drowning in rent, every couple delaying marriage because they can’t afford a place to live, every parent lying awake wondering if their child will ever own a home. “Trinidad and Tobago is in a housing crisis: 77% …

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to speak with two truly inspiring members of the Cocoa Research Centre (CRC) at The UWI: Professor Pathmanathan Umaharan, its head, and Dr Darin Sukha, its food technologist. I met them 16 years ago, when I started working at the university as …

Today, when I look around in the world, what do I see?/ I see footprints that man has left on the sand/ While walking through time./ I see fruits of our ambition, figments of our imaginations/ And I ask myself, When will it end? When will it end?/ It is …

In a Field Guide to Getting Lost (2005), Rebecca Solnit wrote of the places in which one’s life is lived: “They become the tangible landscape of memory, the places that made you, and in some way you too become them. They are what you can possess and, in the end, …

Little things add up. Irritants that are not, of themselves, enough to make you feel besieged. Combined and constant, they are damaging to the psyche—the way water dripping away for years can erode rocks. Feral cats and stray dogs prowling the neighbourhood, stripping garbage bags and shredding the contents. Garbage …

I intended to write an open letter to the chair of the San Juan/Laventille Regional Corporation, Richard Walcott. Initially, it was to ask what the municipal body can do about the posse of feral cats that has overtaken the area. When the street was overrun by dozens of free-range chickens …

Imagine that you could have every single thing your heart desires. No restrictions. Do you think you could envisage it all at once? I mean, do you believe that on any given day you know precisely what it would take to make you absolutely content? Unlikely, I’d say at first, …

Responses to the declaration of a state of emergency have predictably been draped in political flags. As usual, everyone knows what should be done, and just as in West Indies cricket, everyone knows where the blame falls. What continues to be apparent is that it is not politically expedient to …