Contributed
The area the Cockpit Country Stakeholders Group (CCSG) has defined as the Cockpit Country. This is the area they are calling on the government not to mine for bauxite.

Gareth Manning, Sunday Gleaner Reporter

Environmental experts are rejecting comments by the Jamaica Bauxite Institute (JBI) that mining in the Cockpit Country will not destabilise biodiversity in the area.

Environmentalists have long been opposing mining in the 5,000 acre densely vegetated Cockpit, but in an interview with the Jamaica Information Service recently, executive director of the institute, Paris Lyew-Ayee, said the arguments of the lobbyists had no basis because the core area of the Cockpit will be untouched.

The prospective areas to be mined, Mr. Lyew-Ayee said, were valleys and that will not have an effect on limestone in the region. He also maintained that mining would not contaminate water sources as argued by some environmentalists because it was too far below the surface.

He added that the sophistication of equipment for exploration will ease destruction to the environment. This will allow for the exploration of the forest's interior without using heavy equipment such as tractors.

"It's no different than a group of bird watchers going in ... So all that you are really doing is going in and taking your samples, plugging back the holes and all you really leave are your footprints," he added.

Endemic species

He also noted that endemic species could be preserved in the event of mining by placing them in sanctuaries and returning them to their habitat once mining was completed.

But scientists are not so convinced by Lyew-Ayee's assurance. Consultant scientist, Dr. George Procter, who has been studying plant and animal life in the Cockpit Country for over 50 years says any disturbance of the area, by even exploration, will result in an imbalance of the region's humidity which is paramount to the survival of many of its 106 endemic species of plants and also indigenous fauna such as the giant swallowtail butterfly.

The insect, which formerly existed in the Blue and Diablo mountains, now only calls the Cockpit Country home. Dr. Procter explains that they can only survive in a habitat of 100 per cent humidity, which is provided by the thick vegetation of the Cockpit all year round. Even a slight disturbance of this climate will drive it extinct.

Unable to restore conditions

"In order to even explore, you have to build roads and as soon as you build roads, you drastically affect the humidity. And many of the organisms that occur in that area depend on high humidity for survival," he says.

"The giant swallow tail [butterfly] thrives under those conditions and even if a giant swallowtail larva goes through its pupa stage and emerges as an adult, it cannot spread its wings and fly away until the humidity is total. If it is any dryer than [it is supposed to be] then the insect cannot spread its wings and it will die," he continued.

Some flora such as the filmy fern, which exists only in the Cockpit, would also face extinction he explained, if humidity were to be altered. This is an epiphyte and grows on the trunks of trees. The Cockpit is home to 15 endemic species of ferns.

Dr. Procter says creating a sanctuary of any kind to preserve the endemic species of flora and fauna while bauxite companies go on with mining activities will be ineffective and will be too expensive. He opines that such a feat will be virtually impossible because the companies will be unable to restore the conditions which are crucial to the survival of species in the area.

Executive director of the Southern Trelawny Environment Agency and scientist, Hugh Dixon agrees. He says 90 per cent of plants in the Cockpit are yet to be chemically assessed to determine their value and so it will be impossible for the plants to be replaced once they have been destroyed.

"How is it they are going to tell me that they have an inventory of all the plants in any one area, scientifically labelled so you know that all of what is down there will be put in a sanctuary? The only sanctuary can be the [Cockpit] in its natural form," he says.

Both scientists are not convinced either that the area's water system will go unpolluted. Dr. Procter argues that even simple exploration could pose serious harm to the water quality in that area because there is a risk of poor garbage disposal that could find its way into ground water. Much of the water in the Cockpit is stored in soft limestone called aquifers and it channels underground into some major rivers, including the Martha Brae and Black River, or develops into springs. Once these rocks are dug up, whether by mining or exploration, the water can become contaminated, the scientists say.

Eco-tourist destination

But what bothers the scientists is the unsutainability of mining the area. They believe more can be earned from the resources if it is marketed as an eco-tourist destination. The Southern Trelawny Environmental Agency is already benefiting from a such a product and believes more can be done to develop the Cockpit in that regard so the 73,000 residents living in districts within the Cockpit can benefit more too. The agency has been conducting adventure tours for nearly 10 years, catering mostly to the tourist market.

The Government had assured the nation that there would be no mining in the Cockpit Country, but residents from communities there have indicated that some bauxite companies have been exploring the area for some time now and have even bought land for mining.

Two companies, ALCOA and the Clarendon Alumina Production were granted special exclusive licenses [to explore areas of the Cockpit for bauxite deposits last year] which expired in May this year. It is still not clear whether these licenses were renewed.

The Sunday Gleaner visited, Alps, a small community in the Cockpit where residents say bauxite companies have been exploring and making offers to some community members to purchase their land. The residents, who are mostly small farmers, however, are opposed to such a move. They say if the area is mined they will lose vital resources such as several species of plants which are used for medicine and they will have no other mode of surviving.