Now
we have a revised National Environmental Policy (NEP),
a morph of the earlier 1998 NEP, a sort of top down
series of directives or advisories aimed at citizens,
NGOs, CBOs and so on, claiming this or that about
what Government would do.
Government is leading and its subjects
follow. One does not have to go far from the foreword
to decode its central message. The Government focuses
on "sustainable management of the country's environmental
assets rather than the narrower concept of environmental
protection, which tends to bring into conflict environment
and development" - meaning? And, "the policy
therefore assures economic development is not undermined
by the unsustainable use of our environmental assets".
Exactly what is an environmental asset?
Translated into simple language the policy states
that economic development involving the depletion
of the non-renewable petroleum and gas resources overrides
everything else, including the natural environment.
Rents from the wasting resource will be the tools
to transform the economy, begging the question of
the possibility of sustainable management of a resource
that is depleted with its extraction.
In the policy statement the argument
is made that most of the complaints registered at
the Authority are about noise and other pollution.
This does not necessarily mean that citizens of all
strata and backgrounds are not aware of other environmental
issues.
It might surprise the EMA to know
that there are many at all levels of society who are
fully aware of many of the critical issues and problems.
All that is necessary is to talk to the teachers and
students and read the letters columns. The real issue
is that of the pathetic indifference of all political
parties, yes all, to facing up to the reality of a
densely populated island being entirely dependent
on non-renewable energy resources and the need for
firm environmental management in its broadest sense.
Unfortunately the type of management
necessary will be highly unpopular with the electorate,
most of it now settled in maximum consumption mode
with the expectation that it will last indefinitely,
and with the Foreign Direct Investors and their shareholders.
Much of policy is so much eco-chatter
with sustainable this and sustainable that and wise
use and wetlands and coral reefs and sea grass beds
and environmentally sensitive areas and environmentally
sensitive species and biodiversity and CITES and Ramsar
and Small Island States and so on. But even a first
reading of the new NEP gives one a jolt or two.
There is absolutely no mention of
agricultural land as a natural resource to be used
wisely for this and future generations. Agricultural
land is being alienated at an alarming rate. Nor is
there any reference to the fact that national land
use planning has flown from the Ministry of Planning
to the Ministry of Energy and its subsidiaries, the
NGC and the NEC, and that a substantial fraction of
the southwestern peninsula, to date about six square
miles, originally designated for forestry and agriculture,
is going to smelters and other energy industries.
What is there is simply in the way and expendable.
But the Caroni and Nariva swamps, Buccoo and the forests
of Matura will all be saved.
And there is so much eco-chatter about
biodiversity and environmentally sensitive species.
What will the policy mean in the "wave of industrialisation"
that will sweep all the way to Icacos, engulfing the
unique biota of the southwestern peninsula. Is the
peninsula an insensitive area? Is it less sensitive
than Matura, Nariva or Caroni? Do the Cedrosian citizens
matter? The peninsula has many area endemic species-the
epiphytic orchid species Oncidium lanceanum, the Cedros
Bee, Oncidium haematochilum, a hybrid between the
former and another native species, Schomburgkia gloriosa,
Heliconia marginata, the Cedros Balisier and Astrocaryum
aculeatum, the Cuyule palm.
Notable animal species include Gasteropelecus
sternicla, the silver hatchet fish, Erythrinus erythrinus,
the Cedros Guabine, and Moenkhausia bondi, the head
and tail light tetra, Leptodactylus macrosternum,
the slender-toed frog, Hyla miniscula, a tree frog
and Thamnodynastes strigatus, a colubrine snake. Are
these expendable? Or will examples of these be maintained
in the Botanical Gardens and the Emperor Valley Zoo
so that we can report to the United Nations that we
are practicing ex situ conservation of endangered
species in accordance with the requirements of the
Biological Diversity Treaty.
Yes,
I grow old, but my bond with the environment that
supports us all remains undiminished. And it is reassuring
to see amongst "the environmental lobby",
as one editor dismisses it, the names Yvonne Ashby,
Elijah Gour, Chathal Healysingh, Wilfred John, Mary
King, Mark Meredith, Reg Potter, Valerie Rogers, Raphael
Sebastien, Martin Sirju, Steve Smith, John Spence,
Eric St Cyr, David Subran and Charles Thavenot, a
diverse mix of independent minds who share the common
concern that we do not produce another "Waste
Land".
Julian
Kenny
is
a distinguished retired Professor of Zoology, He is
the Chairman of Trustees of the Guardian Life Wildlife
Find.
Petroleumworld not necessarily share these views.
