West Indies, a crescent-shaped group of islands is more than 3,000 km long, separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north. From the peninsula of Florida on the mainland of the United States, the islands stretch 2000 km southeast ward, then 800 km south, then west along the north coast of Venezuela on the South American mainland.

Multi-cultural heritage is enshrined in the many islands here. In parts of the Caribbean, multi-culturalism itself is the cultural norm and diversity is the force that unites the community. Although officially a quarter of the Caribbean population is English-speaking, the largest linguistic group is Spanish speaking, some 22% speak French while only 1% speak Dutch. In the French islands, cultural identity is strong, and many French-speaking islanders speak of a French culture as distinguished from English Caribbean culture.

The Caribbean’s Pacific trade has also brought a large Chinese influence into Trinidad and other areas. The East Indians brought to Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Suriname, Jamaica, and other parts of the Caribbean to work on the sugarcane, rice, and cocoa estates brought with them the many languages of India and developed a lingua franca, Caribbean Hindustani.

Cricket is the main sports in the islands. From the earlier times of the 3 Ws, viz. Walcot, Worrel and Weeks, emerged Gary Sobers, Clive Lloyd, (King) Richards, Wes Hall, Charlie Griffith, Brian Lara and the pace battery of Andy Roberts, Malcolm Marshal, Michael Holding (poetry in motion!) and Joel Garner. Who can forget the all round performances of Sobers, or the Big Cat destroying the opposition, not to mention the most laid-back stylish batting of Richards. Remember the 1976 Bangalore test between India and the Windies, which was a debut match for Richards and the stupendous catch he took in the silly mid-on position to dismiss Gavaskar? It was an act of ultimate athleticism, only comparable to the acrobatic fielding efforts of cricketers like Jonty Rhodes and more recently Ravi Jadeja and Nicholas Pooran. The contributions made by people of Indian origin to the West Indies cricket cannot also be overlooked. Sonny Ramadin, Rohan Kanhai, Alvin Kallicharan, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Sunil Narine and Chandrapaul, to name a few.

From these islands of sand and sunshine came an RFQ from out of the blue for an incinerator system. This was a full-fledged system with all the works ordered by a Company in Trinidad and Tobago for a Common Hazardous Waste Incineration Facility.

There was also a very large shredder for shredding tyres.

We got the incinerator system ready for the first shipment, but due to severe shortage of containers, there has been an unavoidable delay in shipping the readied equipment. The shredder will go in the second lot.

We are happy to be able to continue our connection with the West Indies and hope to commission the plant in the near future.