Penal is a town in south
Trinidad
Trinidad is the larger and more populous of the two major islands of Trinidad and Tobago. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is often referred to as the southernmos ...
,
Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago (, ), officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean. Consisting of the main islands Trinidad and Tobago, and numerous much List of islands of Trinidad and Tobago, small ...
. It lies south of
San Fernando,
Princes Town, and
Debe, and north of
Moruga,
Morne Diablo
Morne is an Old-French word for a small mountain. It may refer to:
* Morne a Chandelle, a village in the Sud-Est department of Haiti
* Morne-à-l'Eau, a commune in Guadeloupe
* Morne Bois-Pin, the fourth highest mountain in Haiti
* Morne la Vigie, ...
and
Siparia
Siparia is a town in southern Trinidad, in Trinidad and Tobago, south of San Fernando, southwest of Penal and Debe and southeast of Fyzabad. Also called "The Sand City", it was originally a non- Mission Amerindian settlement. Siparia grew to ...
. It was originally a
rice
Rice is the seed of the grass species '' Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice) or less commonly '' Oryza glaberrima'' (African rice). The name wild rice is usually used for species of the genera '' Zizania'' and ''Porteresia'', both wild and domestica ...
- and
cocoa
Cocoa may refer to:
Chocolate
* Chocolate
* ''Theobroma cacao'', the cocoa tree
* Cocoa bean, seed of ''Theobroma cacao''
* Chocolate liquor, or cocoa liquor, pure, liquid chocolate extracted from the cocoa bean, including both cocoa butter and ...
-producing area but is now a rapidly expanding and developing town. The population is 12,281.
The heart of Penal contains many businesses while the outskirts focus on agricultural development. Penal has a market, police station, branches of three banks (
Scotiabank
The Bank of Nova Scotia (french: link=no, Banque de Nouvelle-Écosse), operating as Scotiabank (french: link=no, Banque Scotia), is a Canadian multinational banking and financial services company headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. One of Canada ...
,