This 'No Dumping' sign is surrounded by a small hill of garbage on Middle Cay of the Pedro Cays. - ANDREW SMITH/PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
The Pedro Bank Management Project aims to reduce coral reef degradation by providing solutions to two main threats - over-fishing and degradation of coral reefs and coral cays, due to unsustainable development.
AFTER YEARS of neglect, a multi-sectoral team has been constituted to restore the Pedro Cays to an acceptable state of cleanliness.
The clean-up process will include removal of several tons of garbage, a process which will require extra-budgetary funding, according to Errol Greene, executive director of the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA).
"Its a significant amount, comprising PET bottles, cans, styrofoam cups, old batteries, old household appliances, old diesel engines for electricity generators, and I fear some of these materials might be hazardous," Greene said.
On December 19 the multi-sectoral team comprising the NSWMA, the Nature Conservancy (TNC), Fisheries Division, National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA), the Coastguard, Ministry of Land and Environment, and the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) visited the three cays.
Following that visit, the sanitation agency designed a plan for removing the garbage. "We will have to secure a barge to go out there and clean the cays and transport the garbage. We will need a bobcat or a backhoe to dig up what is buried and package it and bring it back to land," said Greene.
Located 158 kilometres south west of Kingston, the Pedro Cays comprise three main cays, known commonly to the fishermen as North East Cay, Middle Cay and South West Cay. South West Cay was designated a bird sanctuary in the 1970s, while the other two continue to be used by the fishermen. The Jamaica Defence Force also operates a security post on Middle Cay.
Beyond the immediate task of removal of garbage, a plan is to be presented to the Government for the long-term maintenance of the cays and the management of the natural resources on the nearby Pedro Banks.
AIM TO REDUCE CORAL REEF DEGRADATION
The Pedro Bank Management Project aims to reduce coral reef degradation by providing solutions to two main threats - over-fishing and degradation of coral reefs and coral cays, due to unsustainable development.
Nathalie Zenny of TNC is the project manager. "Our involvement is essentially through the Fisheries Division, to collect base-line information about the reefs and banks. This is important to the project, since very little is known about reef habitat, fish population and wildlife population," she told The Gleaner.
Zenny shares Greene's concern that over-fishing and high human densities on the Pedro Cays are endangering the survival of the bank as a viable and functioning ecosystem. "Wide-ranging, innovative and rigorous conservation and management measures are being implemented to ensure that it remains a sustainable and important commercial, biological and historical area," she said.
Stephen Smikle, of the Fisheries Division confirmed that his department has direct responsibility for management of the Pedro Cays and issues yearly licences to fishermen who are based there.
He conceded, however, that there were some un-licensed fishermen doing business at the cays, a matter of concern for the authorities.
There have also been reports that, in recent years, female prostitutes have made their way across to the cays and are doing a thriving business. Smikle declined to comment in-depth on those reports, but he told The Gleaner that the Fisheries Department had reported the matter to the police.
Greene is less reticent about this and other issues at the cays, which he describes as "a piece of paradise". Fisheries grants licences for people to use the cays as a base, not for permanent living. The soldiers tell of women giving birth over there and having to be rushed to (the main)land. Living in those circumstances cannot be healthy," he said.
