More political will needed here for mangrove protection -FAO report

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More political will needed here for mangrove protection -FAO report
Stabroek News, Monday, March 3rd 2008

Guyana has to show more political will in protecting mangroves for
their habitat and environmental richness, a report by the Food and
Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has said.

The report, entitled, 'The World's Mangroves 1980 to 2005',
acknowledges that afforestation and reforestation activities have taken
place in Guyana. But it says also that all South American countries
with the exception of Guyana have at least one Ramsar mangrove site,
indicating added political will to protect these habitats and their
environmental richness.

The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, signed in Ramsar, Iran, in 1971, is
an intergovernmental treaty providing for national action and
international cooperation for the conservation and judicious use of
wetlands and their resources. Guyana is still to sign on.

"…More efforts could be undertaken at the national and regional
levels to implement appropriate strategies and effectively protect
these ecosystems," the report points out. It further states that for
Guyana, updated inventories would contribute greatly to a better
estimate of the extent of mangroves.

Awareness is slowly building among coastal residents as to the
importance of mangroves to sea defence and work at the level of
government is progressing apace in Guyana's drive to regenerate and
conserve mangrove stands along the coastlands.

The FAO states that the world has lost around 3.6 million hectares of
mangroves since 1980, equivalent to an alarming 20 per cent loss of
total mangrove area, according to a recent mangrove assessment study.
However, the study also indicates that the rate of mangrove loss is
slowing around the world.

According to the report, the total mangrove area has declined from 18.8
million hectares in 1980 to 15.2 million in 2005, according to the
report. "There has, however, been a slowdown in the rate of mangrove
loss: from some 187,000 hectares destroyed annually in the 1980s to
102,000 hectares a year between 2000 and 2005, reflecting an increased
awareness of the value of mangrove ecosystems," the FAO said.

Although Guyana has commenced pilot projects across the country for the
regeneration of mangroves, a lot is still to be done on the social side
of things as it relates to people squatting on mangrove lands.

Vegetate

An official at the Sea Defence Division of the Ministry of Works,
Geoffrey Vaughn noted that people still continue to live illegally on
some of the dams where the mangroves should be freely allowed to
vegetate.

He said that apart from the European Union funding through the Eighth
European Development Fund (EDF) for shore zone management, the
government is getting some amount of funding from the World Bank for
the regeneration of mangroves.

"We just did a socio-economic study of the project areas under the
Eighth EDF and we intend to look at the findings and see how we will
proceed," Vaughn said, adding that the project areas included some
villages along the Corentyne Coast, West Coast Demerara and some
sections of the East Coast Demerara.

The government has included in the 2008 Budget an allocation of $2.2
billion for the construction, rehabilitation and maintenance of sea
defences and will include mangrove regeneration. Under this programme,
government will commence its shore zone management, which envisages the
cultivation of mangrove plantations, in appropriate locations, to be
utilised as natural sea defence barriers. These works will augment
additional works being done under other programmes on the sea defence.

In Berbice, the loss of mangrove forests was for the most part
attributable to the actions of humans. However, the depletion in the
Essequibo was found to be naturally occurring. On a visit to the
Corentyne during mid-2007, this newspaper learnt that mangroves were
still being burnt and used to build roads.

Personnel from the Sea Defence Division on the Essequibo Coast had told
this newspaper last year that there is a 20-year cycle of erosion for
the mangrove plants, during which they disappear for a while and then
return. At Westbury, Bounty Hall and Better Success on the Essequibo
Coast, there was erosion in some areas, while in others the foliage of
the mangroves was healthy.

The FAO cited high population pressure, the large-scale conversion of
mangrove areas for shrimp and fish farming, agriculture, infrastructure
and tourism, as well as pollution and natural disasters as the major
causes for the destruction of mangroves.