The olive growing associations "Antivari" and "Maslinijada" from Bar have sent an appeal to the Ministry of Spatial Planning, Urbanism and State Property to relocate the highway route from the Spatial Plan of that municipality, which is supposed to pass through local olive groves.
As stated in the letter, which "Vijesti" has access to, the planned highway route, or rather its corridor, threatens a unique area, a complex of tens of thousands of olive trees of inestimable age and value in the area of Sustaš, Marjal, Spilice and Stari Bar, or in the cadastral municipalities of Stari Bar and Sustaš.
In their proposal and suggestion to the Draft Amendments to the Spatial and Urban Plan (SUP) of the Municipality of Bar, they appealed for this corridor to be relocated.
As they said, they were familiar with the planned Draft of the Urban Development Plan, which is under public discussion, and were unpleasantly surprised by the fact that, according to that planning document, the planned highway route completely and with its entire width enters a unique olive grove area.
"With its intervention, it literally passes through its middle, splitting, destroying and irrevocably taking away a unique, and so far preserved, space, where there are almost 80 thousand olive trees, each several centuries old, on several square kilometers. We are shocked by the fact that someone could even think of designing a road through ancient olive groves and endangering the most beautiful space above Bar, which serves agricultural, tourist, recreational and ecological purposes," the olive growers pointed out.
The area of Sustaš, Marjala, Spilice, Velembus and Stari Bar, they stated, with preserved thousand-year-old olive trees, represents a rarity and uniqueness in spatial terms, not only in Montenegro, but also in this part of the Mediterranean and Europe.
"Every foreigner who knows what a preserved area and the cult of the olive tree are is amazed and enchanted by this beauty, ambiance, and agricultural and ecological values," claim the olive growers of Bar.
Endangering it would be the most terrible ecological, cultural and agricultural crime, they say, contrary to the Constitution and all applicable laws, primarily the Olive Growing Act, which provides for rigorous penalties for the destruction of even a single olive tree older than a hundred years.
Since this concerns plantations of over 80 thousand trees, they pointed out, each of which is over a hundred years old, they emphasize that this would be a serious crime against olive growing, olive growers, and Bar, for which olive growing is the oldest cultural and civilizational tradition.
"We note that above this olive grove area, bordering it and its edge, extends the area of the Mukoval hill, which is overgrown with bushes and macchia and does not have a single olive tree, and where the planned highway route could be relocated," they said.
Iz Radunović's The ministries previously told "Vijesti" that, in accordance with the law, after the announcement of the public hearing, a notification of the public hearing was sent to the competent authorities and the Municipality of Bar, and that upon its completion, the processor will consider all comments, proposals and suggestions submitted during the public hearing period.
"Both those submitted by the competent institutions and the Municipality of Bar, and those submitted by interested users of the space, will be answered within the Report on the Public Discussion on the Draft Amendments to the Urban Planning of the Municipality of Bar and the Strategic Environmental Impact Assessment, which will be published on the official website of the Ministry after receiving the opinion of the Review Council. Based on the Report on the Public Discussion, the processor will prepare a Proposal for a Planning Document," the Ministry of Spatial Planning said.
Bonus video:
