PM: Exercise ‘social conscience’ in environmental protection
Published:Wednesday | May 3, 2023 | 12:44 AMAsha Wilks/Gleaner Writer
PRIME MINISTER Andrew Holness is encouraging Jamaicans to exercise their ‘social conscience’ in protecting the environment through participation in upcoming Labour Day activities.
Holness was speaking at the official launch and announcement of the programme of activities for Workers’ Week and Labour Day 2023 at the Office of the Prime Minister in St Andrew on Tuesday.
The activities are being held under the theme ‘Plant a Tree for Life – Promoting Climate Change Mitigation, Food Security and Road Safety’.
He stated that climate change was one of the greatest challenges that small islands experienced and that to lessen its effects, action needed to be taken to protect the environment.
As a result, the national Labour Day project – led by Holness, Opposition Leader Mark Golding, and portfolio ministers – will see 10,000 trees planted along Highway 2000 in the vicinity of Hartlands Road in St Catherine, entering from Old Harbour Road.
“This is part of a larger programme to beautify our major traffic corridors and to add a certain aesthetic and a calming appeal to our infrastructure,” the prime minister said.
Holness bemoaned that typically, through the building out of infrastructure involving the use of cement – which was “one of the drivers to climate change” – trees were removed and sometimes not replaced.
“What we have done, giving direct instruction now to the NWA (National Works Agency) and the Forestry Department, is that wherever we have to move a tree, we are going to seek to replant a tree, and if the tree can be moved and then restored and planted somewhere else, then we will do that,” he said.
Within sections of the Corporate Area slated to undergo redevelopment that will affect some 200 trees, Holness said that the planting of 3,000 trees would take place. He noted that in environs such as East Kings House Road, Lady Musgrave Road, and Arthur Wint Drive, work has already begun to replace them.
He added that the Government is currently assessing how many trees can be rescued and is seeking to obtain equipment to aid this effort.
The focus for Labour Day 2023 was born out of the Forestry Department’s national drive to plant three million trees in three years. This initiative, which was launched by Holness in October 2019, has the objective of supporting national development in the areas of climate change and national reforestation to increase forest cover and establish high-value urban green spaces for all Jamaicans.
Impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, the target of three million trees was not reached. Some 2.5 million trees have been planted under the programme.
Holness is hopeful that the target will be reached after concluding Labour Day municipal-led tree-planting initiatives that will be conducted islandwide to bolster the population of trees endemic to the respective parishes.
Partnering ministries in Labour Day activities include the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, and the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation. Other ministers and ministries will also be mobilised to support the effort.
Labour Day focus on climate change mitigation
The focus of Labour Day includes climate change mitigation – plant a tree for life; food security; the Grow Smart, Eat smart campaign – involving the planting of fruit trees, backyard farming and school gardens and road safety, to include the painting of pedestrian crossings.
Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries Pearnel Charles Jr encouraged Jamaicans to “plant with purpose” as planting a tree was essential for life and the survival of humans.
The ministry will be providing 15,000 assorted fruit seedlings, to be distributed by all the parish offices of the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) and the National Irrigation Commission (NIC). The emphasis will be on farmers planting orchards as well as individuals and householders supporting and sustaining family and personal nutrition.
The ministry will provide support through the Jamaica 4-H Clubs for the establishment of two school gardens and the revitalisation and expansion of 12 such existing gardens to benefit more than 4,000 students across the island.
The ministry will also provide vegetable seedlings and other agricultural inputs, and the NIC will design and implement an irrigation system for the newly established gardens.
It will also provide 4,000 backyard farming kits, through RADA, to promote home gardening in urban communities, to help the ministry achieve its objectives of the ‘Grow Smart, Eat Smart’ campaign, to strengthen food security, drive resilience, advance sustainability in the sector and improve efficiencies.
Worker’s Week will be celebrated from Sunday, May 14, with a church service at Church of the Open Bible on Washington Boulevard in St Andrew, to Tuesday, May 23.
In the celebration of 85 years of labour relations in Jamaica, Holness, in his reflection, stated that it “took tremendous struggle and fortitude” to get Jamaica to where it is today since the 1938 labour riots, which broke out across the island for better wages, equality, and basic rights.
“We’ve come a far way since then, but the struggle is still continuing,” he said, while urging citizens to never forget the leaders and workers in the labour movement.