Earth Today | City harbour worth cleaning
Published:Thursday | April 11, 2019 | 12:00 AM
STAKEHOLDERS ARE convinced of the value of cleaning Kingston Harbour, which is once again making news headlines, after decades of being burdened by pollution.
Scientist, Professor Mona Webber of the University of the West Indies (UWI) is among them, noting that there is much to be gained from cleaning the harbour, as she referenced information from her own research work presented at the recent GraceKennedy Foundation lecture that focused on the topic ‘Clean Kingston Harbour: Pipe Dream or Pot of Gold’.
“We mentioned in the lecture that it (the harbour) is a multi-use resource. Shipping is affected by pollutants. Because it is eutrophic, it is not like it has a lot of heavy metals and really bad pollutants, things like barnacles and other hard-shell organisms – like oysters – they very quickly attach to the hull of ships and grow and actually increase the weight of ships over time. So you have to remove your ship, dry dock and clean it,” explained Webber, director of the Centre for Marine Sciences at the university.
“The power plants use seawater for cooling, and their intake pipes are being blocked by the vast growth of those organisms. All of these spell economic loss,” she added.
And there are other issues.
“Persons in Kingston, persons who live around the harbour, must be able to use this resource. There must be a way for us to have some recreation, though it might not be the same as some other places. We must be able to get fish without worry. We must be able to protect the mangroves and the other vegetation that maintain the integrity of the palisades, and the harbour is still an excellent nursery. All uses are improved or benefit from a cleaner harbour,” Webber said.
Dr Wayne Henry, director general of the Planning Institute of Jamaica, from his presentation at the lecture, was of a similar mind.
“Studies undertaken in 1997 estimated the value of Kingston Harbour at US$510 million and included values for fishing, recreation, shipping, education, industry and commerce. The estimated value of the harbour in that study, however, did not account for indirect use values, such as the values associated with services related to flood prevention and storm surge, which the coral reefs and surrounding mangroves provide,” said Henry.
“The pollution of the Kingston Harbour has a detrimental effect on the reputation of Kingston and Jamaica, and carries both economic as well as environmental impacts,” he added.
Henry – a former vice-president of Scotiabank Group Jamaica, chief technical adviser in the Ministry of Finance, World Bank representative in Jamaica, and lecturer in economics at The UWI – noted his own support for collaborative efforts to clean the harbour, given the implications for sustainable development.
“A concerted effort is required from Government, the private sector and citizens to clean up the Kingston Harbour. A vibrant economy within the downtown area and its environs could, in the long run, reduce crime and violence; improve prospects for businesses; and enhance the aesthetic appeal, thus contributing to the overall impact of attracting more locals and tourists to the nation’s capital and, importantly, assist us in propelling sustainable prosperity in Jamaica,” he said in the lecture.
The GraceKennedy Foundation, which has made it its work to provide assistance in education, the environment, and health and well-being, has been working to re-energise stakeholders, in and outside of the public sector, to address the pollution of the harbour. So far, with the input of those stakeholders, they have come up with a concept note that is to be costed and then fielded to potential funders for action.
Quizzed as to their motivation to mobilise stakeholders to clean or otherwise have the harbour cleaned, executive director Caroline Mahfood said: “We are downtown and we are going to be celebrating our 100th anniversary in three years. We work with kids in the community. It is a part of our DNA. (Further), working with Professor Webber, she has exposed to us a lot of what is happening with the Kingston Harbour, and what is paining us is what is going to happen to the youth 20 years from now if we do not act now.”