PE­TER CHRISTO­PHER

Se­nior Re­porter

pe­ter.christo­pher@guardian.co.tt

If we need­ed any sign that cli­mate change is here, the Hot Spell Warn­ing for T&T is ev­i­dent.

Plan­ning Min­is­ter Pen­ne­lope Beck­les-Robin­son said cli­mate change was re­al and called on the pub­lic to take greater per­son­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for the en­vi­ron­ment.

“Cli­mate change is re­al. We all have to take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty in some form to be a lit­tle more con­scious about is­sues as it re­late to the en­vi­ron­ment. And what can we do in terms of tak­ing per­son­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty in terms of our ac­tions so we do not con­tribute to mak­ing cli­mate change worse than it is al­ready,” said Beck­les.

The min­is­ter lament­ed that tonnes of garbage were once again re­cov­ered from lo­cal beach­es dur­ing the In­ter­na­tion­al Coastal Cleanup Cam­paign yes­ter­day.

Beck­les-Robin­son took part in the cleanup along­side vol­un­teers and Queen’s Roy­al Col­lege Scout Troop at the Fore­shore in Mu­cu­rapo.

“If you look, you will see tyres, and suit­cas­es. I mean the items that you would find most preva­lent are bot­tles, and plas­tic bot­tles. It takes about 20-plus years for plas­tic bags to de­com­pose and in the case of plas­tic

bot­tles, you are talk­ing about any­thing like 400-plus years. So that has an im­pact on the fish. Just in our lives in terms of flood­ing and oth­er things ... So this is all about ask­ing peo­ple to take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty,” said Beck­les-Robin­son.

She urged the pub­lic to stay alert and take pre­cau­tions fol­low­ing the heat swell alert ad­vi­so­ry be­ing placed at yel­low on Fri­day. Mean­while, she al­so hopes that pro­gres­sive talks and so­lu­tions could be found to the prob­lem in the up­com­ing COP28.

“It’s all about cli­mate change. Cop 28 will be tak­ing place in Dubai in the next cou­ple of months. And glob­al­ly, peo­ple are talk­ing about so­lu­tions. What can you do per­son­al­ly be­cause we know the im­pact I mean the cost in terms of elec­tric­i­ty, air con­di­tion­ing,” she said, “But just take your own re­spon­si­bil­i­ty as you go out in­to the heat. Make sure you drink wa­ter and try to be safe be­cause it gave us a yel­low yes­ter­day which means you know we must pay at­ten­tion to the sig­nals that will be sent to us from the Met Ser­vices. “