Nicaragua Set to Start One Phase of $50B Canal to Link the Pacific, Atlantic Oceans

摘要

Nicaragua is on track to start building a mammoth waterway connecting the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as the project's first phase met environmental safety regulations for access roads and construction of a port, a government official said Dec. 17, 2014. "The feasibility studies for the access roads and construction port are ready and the process will begin Dec. 22," Paul Oquist Kelley, minister of national public policy, told Bloomberg BNA. He said a new round of feasibility studies, which include environmental impact assessments for other sections of the project, will be completed in March. Oquist emphasized, however, that the heavier work on the project, which is scheduled for completion in 2019, won't begin until all the feasibility and environmental studies are done. He said the complex project, which will also feature a free-trade zone and tourism complex, will have many phases.