As this blog is being given life the clock ticks away on Earth Day. The fact that its significance is not mentioned in any serious way in the local media, or any strident mention made of it by those responsible in government and other relevant NGO agencies, sums up how confused we are about what our priorities must be in 2012. Ironically there is currently a lot of play about who should buy our precious land resource to build a hotel at Heywoods or guest houses at Whitehaven. It is to be regretted that Barbadians are not able to work at achieving multiple objectives at the same time given the current reality.
The perennial issue of the need for Barbadians to prioritize building out a plan to ensure food security and the focus Earth Day brings to the matter bears a mention. What will it take to create the awaking among the current generation of Barbadian that we must plan to feed ourselves, our children and generations to come? Food security is no joke and while we cannot have 100% food security there are initiatives which individuals and government alike can mobilize to mitigate the risk of doing nothing.
Are we happy that we can continue to earn enough foreign exchange to be able to stock our supermarket shelves with five brands of shoe polish, ten brands of cereal etc.? Whither the plan to engage in functional cooperation with Dominica and how can we leverage the wasteland of an emerging Guyana which yearns for investment? What the hell are we doing?
On an island surrounded by water why are fish farms not established? Are we willing to sit back and harp on the fact that T&T playing Baje on a string over a fishing agreement? Yes we love our flying fish, yes history records that it complements coucou as our national dish but if the damn fish is migratory what the hell are we planning to do to fill our blasted stomachs until they return? Why the focus on planting concrete alone?
A read of the online journal GoFishntellyourstory mentions how the developed world is using technology to enter our waters to fish. Sadly what was thought to be unlimited supplies of some species of fish are being depleted by monster fishing trawlers. …the world’s largest trawlers and factory vessels, like the astonishing. 230-meter Lafayette (holds 14 million metric tons of fish), which is Russian-flagged and owned through several holding companies by PacAndes, a publicly listed company in Hong Kong that is also based in Hong Kong… is an example of how vulnerable is our fish resource. Why can’t our little countries come together and if there is to be any over fishing in our waters we are the ones responsible?
Another issue which Earth Day brings to the fore: was an an environmental impact study done on the underground gas pipeline from T&T with first stop Barbados? Would it not be nice for Barbadians who our government serves to be able to access relevant information to raise our comfort level that our planners are not taking us for stupid? What the hell is the matter with us? Why is it we do not understand Barbados belongs to we and it is we who got to guard it from the predators who are mainly motivated by money and greed?
Second consecutive blog where the laptop keys have been banged in anger. We need to wake up Barbados. We need to reorder our priorities post haste!
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