blackandwhite

Entrepreneurs...

Anyone thought of buying as scrap the HUGE number of wrecked and rusting cars strewn everywhere you look around the island? Fill a few containers with compacted wrecks and ship to hungry markets in China or India, maybe? Perhaps strike a deal with the SLU govt -- a share of the profit to be ploughed back into environmental or public building projects? It might tidy things up a little, aid the deficit AND produce favourable returns.

Naive of me?? Thoughts welcome.

(That's my third posting, Site Admin! Hint!!!)

Pistolpete2

There isn't a day that goes by that I don't consider the number of car shells that litter the landscape - of course there are also the partially stripped vehicles that have the tiniest possibility of just one other part being salvaged, which are kept in storage at the roadside.

I'm not sure that it would be economically viable to ship the wrecks to China or India for nothing, let alone if we had to pay for the scrap.

As for the impact of the littering - well in my view St Lucia has a rather back-to-front view regarding litter. We see countless weed-whacker guys clearing grass verges but rarely is somebody picking up the underlying litter. There is no education programme talking of the negative appearance/impression impact on this tourism island and definitely no talk of penalties for littering.

St Lucians seem to view littering per se as creating employment because the Government then pays for make-work programmes to have it taken away, but not on those verges in seems.

So back to the cars - it would make eminent good sense to have a monthly pick-up of car shells for a nominal fee but for local landfill. If somebody could melt them down or crush them here then so much the better, if indeed there is any export scrap value.

Mitzyboy

It's automatic, if its the pm system you are referring to

jb_has_questions

Funny this. Last week while riding the bus to town I had very similar thoughts. Actually I had two.
The deficits I identified were: lack of an auto wrecker yard and lack of decent sign makers. I know at home people don't leave wrecks because they can get money for them. So I figured there was no wrecking yard. It is a profitable business, the buying of wrecks and the selling of auto parts. Regarding business signs, I find them so small that you can't read them unless you are directly in front of them, definitely not readable from a passing vehicle. I am constantly surprised to learn of a business or shop that I passed numerous times without noticing it was there because of the lack of decent signage.
When I got home I researched both businesses. Apparently there are five wreckers on the island and countless sign makers. So I guess the deficit is not that the businesses don't exist.......

Sarah1234

I think its down to cost, people just dont have the cash in St Lucia that they have in the UK so they will do things themselves, as to auto parts because of duty on cars etc parts are expensive and the wreckers are likewise expensive as well. MY neighbour needed a radiator for his Nissan, a new one was $600EC a second hand one $500EC!

Sarah

Pistolpete2

Had a long chat at the local restau/rumshop about auto parts the other evening. This after getting my car serviced at a major dealer and apparently being the only customer there on that particular day. It seems VAT has done a number on car owners (as well as the rest) and caused them to think twice about going to a dealer to pay consumption tax on top of VAT for what can also turn out to be cheapo generic parts rather than manufacturer's recommended.

I guess this backs up your comment that the second-hand market will be strengthened as a result, even though the price differential makes no kind of sense.

Expect more cars to be stolen to be quickly chopped.