Sometimes a single development project can prove catalytic for a country’s environmental movement. Such might now be the case in the Dominican Republic, where a government decision in March to allow construction of a cement factory next to Los Haitises National Park has provoked an unprecedented opposition campaign by green advocates and opinion leaders.

A key reason for that opposition is Los Haitises itself. Though other Dominican parks contain such distinctive features as North America’s tallest peaks east of the Rockies (over 10,000 feet, or 3,000 meters) and the Caribbean’s lowest point (a salt lake, home to flamingos and crocodiles), Los Haitises combines a unique array of ecological, cultural, and economic resources.

Located in the northeastern region, Los Haitises’ richly varied land and marine habitats host hundreds of endemic species, including some of the world’s most endangered plants and animals. Its caves contain remarkable relics of the Taino Indians, who occupied the area when Columbus landed there on his first voyage, in January 1493. Easily reached by boat from the resort town of Samaná, the park is also a popular destination for ecotourism. And not least in importance, it lies over a vast aquifer containing close to half the country’s water reserves.

Environmentalists warn that pollution from the cement factory and limestone-mining operation planned by the Dominican Mining Consortium would threaten not only the park itself, but also the entire eastern region of the island. They report that intense public concern over the issue has lent unprecedented energy to their movement.

“We are living a decisive moment of our history, since the outcome of this case will set a precedent for similar situations that will arise throughout the island,” Nelson Bautista, coordinator of Acción Verde, the nation’s leading environmental Web site, wrote recently. “The Dominican environmental movement now aspires to see our legal framework and institutions strengthened to the point where abuses like the cement factory will no longer threaten the future of our country’s natural resources.”

Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernández and his Environment Secretary, Jaime David Fernández Mirabal, issued a permit for the cement factory to the consortium on March 23. Small-scale farmers in and around Gonzalo, the community most directly affected by the project, were the first to take issue with the plant. As clearing of the 35-acre (14-ha) site began in April and May, they complained the factory and mining operation would displace them from their traditional lands and pollute the area. Eco-activists then set up a tent village near the cement-plant site in support of the farmers. Opposition subsequently spread to the major cities on the island, where demonstrators held marches, rallies and rock concerts. A protest against the project even occurred in Spain, with the chant “No a la cementera!” echoing in the streets of Barcelona. The same slogan—“No to the cement factory!”—has reverberated through the international blogosphere, generating thousands of messages on Facebook, Twitter, and other sites where “cementera” opponents have signed petitions. On YouTube, the latest protest video features the Ridgway’s hawk (Buteo ridgwayi). This raptor species, all of whose remaining population lives in Los Haitises, is listed by BirdLife International as one of the world’s most endangered birds.

The traditional media have also highlighted the issue. Nuria Piera, the Oprah Winfrey of the Dominican Republic, has come out against the mining operation on her popular television talk show, and newspaper editorials have widely decried it. Dominican scientists have united against the “cementera,” sponsoring seminars to denounce the project at the Academy of Sciences and several of the leading universities. On June 3, the Environmental Commission of the lower house of the National Assembly called on President Fernández and Secretary Fernández Mirabal to annul the consortium’s permit. It also asked that they rescind the contract whereby the state-run sugar corporation, the CEA, had ceded 3,360 acres (1,360 has) to the consortium at an annual rent of US$83,373 for the duration of the project. On June 19, a judge in the Administrative Court of Santo Domingo ordered the suspension of further work on the cement factory until its environmental soundness has been conclusively established.

Faced with this resistance, President Fernández and Secretary Fernández Mirabal saw themselves forced to review their policy. On June 24, the president announced that he had ordered a stay on construction until the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) could reassess the project.

Like Haiti, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic, Los Haitises National Park takes its name from an ancient indigenous word meaning “highlands.” Yet the average height of the round, rocky hills that characterize the region is just 100 to 150 feet (30 to 46 meters), with the tallest reaching 820 feet (250 meters). These land-bound “mogotes” of the interior and the myriad keys of the adjacent bay are all limestone formations, the only difference being that the narrow valleys separating the islets lie under seawater.

The park was established in 1976, and is located largely in Samaná province, with lesser portions in Monte Plata and Hato Mayor provinces. Its northern border extends into the Bay of Samaná, internationally renowned for attracting each winter the North Atlantic’s greatest concentration of humpback whales. The coastal islets and inlets merge with one of the Caribbean’s best-preserved networks of mangrove hammocks. In its northwest quadrant, the park covers the delta formed by the country’s second-largest river, the Río Yuna, whose watershed covers more than 2,000 square miles (5,200 sq kms).

These overlapping marine, freshwater and terrestrial ecotones provide ideal habitat for a wide variety of plant and animal species, many of them endemic. Besides rare orchids and birds, the park shelters two unique mammals: the Hispaniolan hutia (Plagiodontia aedium), the only extant species of its genus, and the Hispaniolan solenodon (Solenodon paradoxus). Like the Ridgway’s hawk, both these endemic species are cited as highly endangered on the IUCN’s Red List. Such is the biodiversity of Los Haitises and Samaná Bay that the region has been proposed for designation by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as a biosphere reserve.

Petroglyphs and pictographs left by the Taino Indians, another feature of Los Haitises National Park, have also become a major flashpoint in the debate over the cement plant. These artworks abound in the area’s many caves. One cave alone, El Ferrocarril, contains 1,243 Taino pictographs, the largest number in a single cave in all the Caribbean. According to Fátima Portorreal, Professor of Natural Resources at the Pedro Henríquez Ureña National University in Santo Domingo, the factory poses a direct threat to the Taino art of the Gumersindo cave because of its close proximity to the plant site. Speleologists are concerned other caves might be damaged by water and air pollution, flooding, or even outright destruction through the mining of limestone.

While indigenous art, as well as flora and fauna, have fueled much of the public concern about the cement project, fears for the future of the aquifer underlying Los Haitises and adjacent lands have loomed particularly large in the debate. The geology of the region consists mainly of the limestone formation known as karst. This porous morphology lends itself to the creation of caves, but, more importantly, to the retention of vast amounts of subterranean water. These underground reserves are fed by the area’s high rainfall, which averages 76 inches (193 cm) annually. According to the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources, they feed 11 rivers, 147 streams and 28 lakes in the eastern part of the country. A study funded by the European Union and conducted by the Dominican government’s Institute of Hydraulic Resources concludes Los Haitises sits atop the country’s second-largest water reserve. It says the park covers 232 square miles (601 sq kms) of the 704-square-mile (1,823-sq-km) karst, one of the most extensive karst formations in the Caribbean.

The owners of the consortium, Dominican businessmen Manuel Estrella and Félix García, have been reticent about defending their cement project publicly. They did not launch their company’s Web site until Aug. 11 of this year, though the company was founded in 2003 with the factory as its principal venture. The Web site states construction of the factory will create 2,500 jobs, with subsequent operation of the plant generating 400 salaried positions, and “agro-forest projects” another 5,600. The consortium also promises a potable water system for Gonzalo and several other nearby communities. According to the Web site, the employment opportunities and other benefits offered by the company would alleviate depredation of Los Haitises, which has suffered historically from incursions by subsistence farmers. On June 6, in the Listín Diario newspaper, consortium geologist Marcos Pérez claimed the cement factory would use green technology and fully meet “all environmental standards.” In the surrounding area, the company would plant almost 4,000 acres (1,600 ha) with fruit trees, he said.

Given the popular outcry, the government has been cautious about justifying the environmental permit it awarded. Environment Secretary Fernández Mirabal tends to refer opponents to the environmental-impact statement the consortium submitted last October. On May 20, Eleuterio Martínez, the Environment Undersecretary for Protected Areas, told the National Assembly: “[t]he factory does not encroach on any protected area.” Defending the assertion later, he contended the site is “well outside Los Haitises Park, and the prevailing winds blow in the opposite direction.”

Though most media outlets have criticized the cement project, El Caribe newspaper has been its greatest advocate, stressing that the plant is 3.5 miles (5.6 kms) from the park, would do no major environmental damage, and will use an eco-friendly dry production process.

The consortium’s environmental-impact statement, posted on the Internet by eco-activists, says the factory would produce 186,252 tons (167,629 metric tons) of Portland cement annually for domestic use, create 200 jobs (not the 400 claimed by the company’s Web site), and require an investment of US$60 million, “excluding complementary installations.” The statement specifies that the project owes its viability to “a concession granted by the Mining Division of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce on July 9, 2008, covering 6,350 hectares [15,690 acres], with a proven abundance of limestone.”

The appeal of the site from a business standpoint is clear, since the karst formation provides a ready supply of the limestone needed by the factory to make cement. The impact statement does not specify whether the consortium or other miners plan to conduct limestone extraction throughout the concession area, which is four times bigger than the area earmarked for immediate exploitation and for rental or sale to the consortium over the next 20 years. On its Web site, the company claims it will mine only 375 acres (152 has) in this period, but that figure seems inexplicably low when compared with the numbers listed elsewhere. The impact statement declares the factory will use 125 gallons (475 liters) of water a minute, all of it extracted from the aquifer, and forecasts 20 different types of pollution, social impacts, and landscape degradation likely to occur. Among the negative factors listed are soil removal, erosion, air pollution, contamination of surface and underground water, and habitat destruction. As for the fruit trees mentioned by Pérez, their planting would likely generate just temporary employment, in the bio-remediation phase of the drastically altered landscape—assuming bio-remediation will be carried out. In the impact statement, the budget line-item for mitigating environmental damage caused by the project has been left blank.

For their part, ecologists argue that the entire Los Haitises region, not just the national park, must be protected to conserve the nation’s water supply. That, they say, is not only a question of habitat protection, but also of human survival. Because the karst is so porous, its interconnected waters are highly vulnerable to pollution; ominously, when the factory’s footings were being dug, a spring flooded them. Luis Carvajal, president of the Environmental Commission of the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo, has joined others in warning that mining could harm underground water supplies.

In jousting over the project so far, opponents have carried the day, creating a politically dangerous public-relations problem for the government. A Gallup poll taken last month shows 85% of Dominicans oppose construction of the factory at its proposed location. Seeking an independent evaluation, President Fernández has won a commitment from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) to reassess the cement operation’s environmental-impact statement and give him a basis for a final decision.

The move did not defuse the controversy, however. When news of it surfaced in July, project opponents questioned why Fernandez turned to the UN’s development agency rather than to the UN Program for the Environment (UNEP). Since then, the UNDP has emphasized that the UNEP will join it in an “inter-agency” assessment of the project.

The UNDP commission held hearings on the issue in Santo Domingo during July 27-31, inviting comment from green groups, community leaders, journalists, scientists, educators, the business sector, and the general public; more than 200 participants attended. The head of the commission, former Colombian Environment Minister Juan Mayr Maldonado, has promised to deliver his report to the Dominican government by the end of September.