For al­most two years since this T&T Guardian se­ries on the en­vi­ron­ment be­gan, en­vi­ron­men­tal leg­is­la­tion has been an­tic­i­pat­ed, to­geth­er with a se­ri­ous look at the im­ple­men­ta­tion of ex­ist­ing laws. Sad­ly this seems not to have hap­pened. T&T has had no new en­vi­ron­men­tal leg­is­la­tion for 12 years on a range of is­sues from re­cy­cling to clean­ing up the tox­ic dumps that pass as land­fills. This seem­ing lack of con­cern over en­vi­ron­men­tal is­sues was high­light­ed as re­cent­ly as Ju­ly, when thou­sands of leatherback tur­tle eggs and hatch­lings were crushed when the Min­istry of Works' Drainage Di­vi­sion en­tered the beach with bull­doz­ers to move wa­ter­logged sand from key nest­ing ar­eas. This is the first in a three-part se­ries ad­dress­ing con­cerns about in­con­sis­ten­cies in en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment at the EMA by con­ser­va­tion­ists who have been work­ing close­ly with the au­thor­i­ty.

Last May, the En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA) ex­pend­ed con­sid­er­able re­sources in host­ing a sea-tur­tle sym­po­sium. This sym­po­sium brought to­geth­er a va­ri­ety of stake­hold­ers en­gaged in the re­search and pro­tec­tion of sea tur­tles in Trinidad and To­ba­go and the wider Caribbean. This fol­lowed an amend­ment to the Fish­eries Act, which banned the hunt­ing of all sea tur­tles, which, with the ex­cep­tion of the gi­ant leatherback tur­tle, had been al­lowed in the past. At the sym­po­sium, EMA of­fi­cials re­port­ed on the sta­tus of sea-tur­tle con­ser­va­tion in Trinidad and To­ba­go. It was stat­ed that the EMA was in the process of es­tab­lish­ing a net­work aimed at fos­ter­ing greater co-or­di­na­tion be­tween coastal com­mu­ni­ties, NGOs and gov­ern­ment agen­cies in­volved in sea-tur­tle con­ser­va­tion, there­by en­sur­ing bet­ter man­age­ment of its pop­u­la­tions and to over­see the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the Sea Tur­tle Re­cov­ery and Ac­tion Plan (STRAP). At the time, se­nior ex­ec­u­tives of the EMA gave the com­mit­ment the EMA would be in­volved in the for­ma­tion of the Sea Tur­tle Net­work, co-or­di­nat­ing the meet­ings of the net­work and most im­por­tant­ly, des­ig­nat­ing the five ma­rine tur­tle species as en­vi­ron­men­tal­ly sen­si­tive species, un­der the En­vi­ron­men­tal­ly Sen­si­tive Species Rules, 2001.

To date, none of these de­liv­er­ables have been ad­dressed, es­pe­cial­ly in the light of the faux pas in man­ag­ing the sit­u­a­tion at Grande Riv­iere, which re­sult­ed in the de­struc­tion of an es­ti­mat­ed one mil­lion sea tur­tle eggs and sub­se­quent neg­a­tive in­ter­na­tion­al pub­lic­i­ty for Trinidad and To­ba­go. Var­i­ous views on the ap­par­ent fail­ure on the EMA's part to man­age the re­me­di­al works through the Cer­tifi­cate of En­vi­ron­men­tal Clear­ance (CEC) Rules have been high­light­ed in the me­dia. At the very least the pro­po­nent of such works should have been ad­vised to ap­ply for a CEC as part of their des­ig­nat­ed ac­tiv­i­ties.

The STRAP for Trinidad and To­ba­go was pre­pared by the Wider Caribbean Sea Tur­tle Con­ser­va­tion Net­work (WIDE­CAST) in 2010. Ac­cord­ing to this re­port, six sea-tur­tle species found in the Caribbean Sea are all list­ed as Crit­i­cal­ly En­dan­gered, En­dan­gered, or Vul­ner­a­ble on the IUCN Red List of Threat­ened Species. The de­c­la­ra­tion of some of the coun­try's most im­por­tant nest­ing grounds-Fish­ing Pond and Matu­ra Beach in 1990 and Grande Riv­iere in 1997-as pro­hib­it­ed ar­eas un­der the Forests Act, re­duc­ing catch­es at these beach­es to near­ly ze­ro. It is im­per­a­tive that the EMA pre­pares for the des­ig­na­tion of the five species of sea tur­tles that vis­it the shores of Trinidad and To­ba­go. This move is crit­i­cal for the fur­ther pro­tec­tion of the species which brings tremen­dous eco­nom­ic ben­e­fit to our coun­try's eco-tourism in­dus­try.

There has been no fol­low-up on any of the de­liv­er­ables promised since the sea-tur­tle sym­po­sium in May and the process of des­ig­nat­ing the five ma­rine tur­tle species as en­vi­ron­men­tal­ly sen­si­tive species has not yet be­gun. The EMA has an oblig­a­tion to ho­n­our its com­mit­ment to pro­tect sea tur­tles. It is un­cer­tain why there has been such a de­lay to es­tab­lish the net­work be­tween civ­il so­ci­ety and gov­ern­men­tal agen­cies in­volved in sea-tur­tle con­ser­va­tion that will help to ex­pe­dite the des­ig­na­tion process.

(To be con­tin­ued)

If you wish to con­tribute to this guest se­ries, send in your ideas to Ira Math­ur at iras­room@gmail.com or cleaningupthemess@guardian.co.tt and join our Face­book page at www.face­book.com/cleaningupthemess?ref=ts