Peter Espeut
THIS WEEK I am in Antigua, but I must break my travelogue to mention a development at home. Last Thursday - World Wetlands Day 2006 - a large section of the Portland Bight Protected Area (southern St. Catherine and southern Clarendon) was recognised as a wetland of global importance and was designated by the United Nations as a 'Ramsar Site'.
People often ask me, "What does RAMSAR stand for?" No, it is not an acronym; it is the city (in Iran, of all places) where the United Nations Convention on the Conservation of Wetlands and Waterfowl was signed. More than 1,000 wetlands all over the world have received this designation, and Jamaica so far has three Ramsar Sites: the Black River Lower Morass (Jamaica's largest wetland), the mangroves of Port Royal (on the right after you pass the airport), and now the wetlands of Portland Bight - the largest mangrove stands in Jamaica.
What is a wetland? Wetlands are what people call 'swamps' when they want to dump them up and fill them in. 'Swamp' is one of those pejorative words that will always make people screw up their faces as they conjure up images of foul-smelling, mosquito-infested, stagnant pools of water - good for nothing, they would have us believe. But wetlands can be of global importance in the scheme of things.
THREE TYPES OF WETLANDS
We have three types of wetlands in Jamaica: herbaceous marshes (like the Black River Morass), mangroves (like Portland Bight and Palisadoes) and salt flats.
Insurance companies should love mangroves. They provide the second line of defence of the land against hurricanes and tsunamis. As bad as the damage and loss of six lives in Portland Cottage was from Hurricane Ivan in 2004, it could have been much worse; 60 people or more could have died had the mangroves of West Harbour, Clarendon, not been there in a healthy condition. Positioned between Portland Cottage and the storm surge, the mangroves cut down the force of the surging sea and the height of the wall of water; even so the storm surge was about 10 feet high. Those Portland Bight mangroves - and their neighbours - have now been recognised to be of global significance - and not just because of this.
The mangroves of Portland Bight are valuable as habitat for waterfowl and other birds, fish, crabs and crocodiles and numerous other animals and plants. Many Jamaicans would be poorer if those wetlands weren't there; in fact, Jamaica and the world would be poorer.
The Portland Bight mangroves purify the air and sea water from certain types of pollution. Being trees, they capture carbon dioxide from the air, removing gases which would have contributed to the greenhouse effect and global warming. Being trees they remove nutrient pollution (nitrates and phosphates) from the water that passes by their roots and stems, making the water cleaner. Lack of space does not permit me to say more.
CONGRATS TO GOV'T
The Jamaican government should be congratulated for recognising the value of the wetlands of Portland Bight and for recommending to the United Nations that they be acclaimed to be of global significance. The next step is now to give them some legal protection. Ramsar designation does not by itself give any legal protection; it only provides international recognition. The Black River Lower Morass became a Ramsar Site in 1998, and in the intervening eight years, no legislation has been passed to offer any sort of protection to what is Jamaica's largest wetland. Anyone can go there and chop down anything or dump up anywhere and they break no law (except maybe acting without planning permission, but then that provision is widely disobeyed). The Portland Bight area itself became 'protected' in 1999, and no regulations are in place there either - not even allowing a protected area manager, or rangers for enforcement! We are good at the show: we have Ramsar Sites and protected areas and biodiversity strategies and lots of policies and action plans, but precious little legislation and even less enforcement.
But Ramsar designation is a start, and we must thank God for that! However, I hope that we will not be satisfied with that.
Peter Espeut is a rural development sociologist and natural resource manager.
