A CALL TO ACTION #BEATAIRPOLLUTION Plant trees… drive less… reduce plastic… commit to cleaning up the air you breathe INSIDE Dust in the wind Bertrand Bhikarry… ...................................................... 3 Policy Needs People Omar Mohammed.... ...................................................... 4 Plea for Acono Valley….. ................................. 6 Bold Approach Needed to Save the Future Lisa Premchand .............................................................. 8 Burning of the Lopinot Forest Donna Mora ................................................................... 9 Forest- Nature’s Air Purifier Johanne Ryan ................................................................. 10 NGC Trees Make Carbon Inroads ................ 12 Water & Flood: Pollution Calamities Vikki Ramdass, Delena Indar, Renaldo Lewis ................................................................ 14 Climate Change Fight-back Gia Gaspard-Taylor ......................................................... 14 A collaboration between the Trinidad Express, the Lloyd Best Institute Photo by Mark Lyndersay Courtesy NGC of the Caribbean and the National Gas Company of Trinidad and Tobago v 3 Dust in the wind By Bertrand Bhikarry Air quality testing conducted by the Environmental Management Authority over the period March 16-20 this year found air o I’m part of this Toba- pollution, measured in Particulate Matters, at levels in excess of the national standard. The Air Quality Index (AQI) for go-based group heading into Port of Spain in the Trinidad and Tobago was then coded Orange – Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups. heat of the dry season. The minibus is having Sissues with its air-conditioner and traffic is tight. We decide to take a break on the Lady Young Look- out as we have some time. What a disappointment. Not speaking about the view, mind you. It’s the dust, then the haze, added to the cocktail of industrial smells the trip has provided thus far. For me in particular as we dawdle around, it is the irritating tickle on the tongue of fine — let’s call it microscopic — gravel. We leave the lookout a great deal faster than expected, not that anyone says anything. But it gets me to thinking. Air quality is a right but it’s one freely sacrificed by almost every person since the acceptance of fire into human life. We’ve tooled fire into the myriad processes that de- liver modern conveniences: Things such as the car, the material for our homes and offices, our kitch- ens and our kids’ toys. Yet trans- port and commercial fire brought — brings with it rather — a slew of particulate matter that hangs around smogging things up, clog- ging lungs, shortening lives. Indeed normal life for the city dweller pos- es a risk curve even greater than chronic cigarette smokers face. Loss of air quality is insidious. You do not see it coming and when it arrives it is almost always expensive to work around, to mit- igate or to fix. The decidedly evil thing about air pollution is that it is practically unavoidable for both the poor and the well-to-do. The poor needs to be where the fires of industry are burning as much as the wealthy or the more educated need to be near those fires if they want to keep an eye on things. The most visible air quality villain in sweet TnT are the vehicles that we have so come to depend upon. In catering to that depend- ency we’ve fallen into the trap of living next to roads so that we can SOURCE: Environmental Management Authority get out and about in our cars and is the world’s first and largest pre- miss links to climate change, itself Not that moving our factories or human life — to recall the World trucks. The upshot is that we live, ventable health risk, a statement starring in mainstream news these drawing raw material from remote Health Organisation’s designation eat and sleep in the fumes generat- worth examining. It means that days. locations fixes anything either. for poor quality air — the remedy ed by our preferred transports, giv- breathing, yes, BREATHING, is inher- Mary Robinson, once UN High Think Sahara dust and the rash of to this one is known and attainable. ing up sizeable chunks of breathing ently more dangerous to the human Commissioner for Human Rights afflictions the Ministry of Health Good air these days does time in the process. Trinidadians, race than tobacco addiction, poor said, “Climate change is probably has been dealing with recently. Bad require political will of course, but however, are not alone in neglect- diet, lack of exercise, high blood the greatest threat to the human air has few geographic limitations, that is subject to the dictate of ing quality of air. Daily we observe pressure, AIDS and malaria. race in the 21st century”. Science it respects political boundaries the people, is it not? Actually, as the plight of people in the great To truly understand how such has since upgraded that opinion to even less. we participate by the very act of cities of the developing nations; a correlation can make sense, a “the greatest threat to life ever”. Somebody somewhere once breathing on World Environment like those in China, India or even few small statistics come into play. Air quality is not always attended said we are architects of our own Day 2019 this June 5th, we simply Africa. The average person eats about one by visual indicators. There can be demise. How true. When we circum- need to elevate ‘air’ to equate with Air pollution is a sweeping man- kilogram of food per day, drinks bad air in elevators, in old or even vent the building codes, eschew ‘life’ and act accordingly. How made disease that kills seven mil- about two kilograms of water, but new warehouses, in lived-in houses. the principles of greening such as long we each can live is really just lion people per year; a full million breathes about ten kilograms of air. And air quality, so invisible, so in- efficient power use, neglect tuning a matter of adjusting lifestyle. Do more than the number of smokers In short, the act of breathing, re- tangible, is the prime link tying what our motors, we are actively and in anything less and we, too, become drawing last gasps, according to quired to sustain life every moment we do to why we suffer. Consider turn impacting our airspace, effec- as dust in the wind. the World Health Organisation. waking or sleeping, will kill if the two familiar examples: The cars we tively poisoning our own bodies as That’s more than the annual com- air quality is bad. It is no surprise like, those highways we want. Each well as our loved ones, even our —Bertrand Bhikarry is a bined total of deaths due to AIDS the term pandemic has recently brings with it a huge cone of activity neighbours. volunteer with Environment and malaria. Moreover, the WHO been applied to poor air quality. that impacts directly on the quality Bear in mind, however, that Tobago. Contact: 620 2080; also recognises that poor air quality But there are also those easy to of air in our immediate environment. of all the diseases that threaten Email [email protected] vi 4 Policy needs people to come alive By Omar Mohammed Some members of the 20-plus community and civil CEO, Cropper Foundation society groups being trained under an EU-funded project to increase their participation in environmental N the National Environmental Policy (NEP 2018), governance in relation to extractive industries. the Government of Trinidad and Tobago outlines a vision for the environment in which natural re- sources are protected while being used sustaina- bly towards the enhancement of the well-being of Iall citizens. A vision for the future — as indeed our past and current — begs for this more hopeful and sustainable approach. In T&T’s 5th National Report to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, our en- vironment is described as being under threat, with the status of ecosystems (coastal and freshwater), major species and major ecosystem services all facing declining trends. In 2016, T&T fell into the top 10 countries with the highest ecological footprint, which looks at how much productive land a person needs in order to produce the resources they need and absorb the waste they create. In 2010, the country had the world’s second highest per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions rate, with carbon dioxide emis- sions more than doubling between 1990 and 2007. More than 33 per cent of Trinidad and Tobago quar- ries operate illegally — with the country losing 20 percent of its watersheds in the past 25 years, and with large parts of its northern watercourses which, to participate in environmental governance, particu- participation of communities and civil society in being discussed. In the High Court case of Ulric it should be emphasised, provide more than half larly in relation to impacts of extractive industries. environmental governance and the downward ‘Buggy’ Haynes Coaching School and others v of Trinidad and Tobago’s potable freshwater, being Over the past few months we have visited trends in Trinidad and Tobago’s environmental Minister of Planning and Sustainable Development, either polluted or overloaded with mine-based silt. communities where people get sick because of sustainability. the court importantly noted that “Consultation is not These impacts speak loudly to a country that dust from illegal quarrying but stay silent out of The Environmental Democracy Index 2015 only about objection but is also about representa- has consistently prioritised economic growth over fear; we heard from a community where unchecked highlights this