‘Murky’ waters

Controversy continues to dog Friday’s restocking of fish in the Rio Cobre in St Catherine, with the People’s National Party (PNP) insisting that it played a role in the exercise.

On Friday, bauxite company UC Rusal (WINDALCO), which was issued a permit to restock the river with no more than 30,000 Tilapia seedstock (fry and fingerling) at multiple locations, commenced the first phase of replenishing the river with fish.

The company, which was responsible for the devastating July 2022 fishkill after effluent from its plant was released into the river, coordinated the restocking exercise through its environment and safety department in conjunction with the National Fisheries Authority (NFA).

But the PNP, following the exercise, immediately hailed the party for delivering on a promise it made to the affected fisherfolk to restock the river with fish following the fishkill.

“In collaboration with Mr Donnie Bunting, a prominent fish farmer, 3,000 Rocky Mountain white fingerlings, supplied by Mr Bunting at the request of Mr [Mark] Golding [president of the PNP] were released into the Rio Cobre, marking a significant step toward the restoration of the river’s aquatic population,” the PNP said in a statement on Friday.

The PNP stated that an additional 17,000 fingerlings would be deposited in the river in the coming months.

The statement issued by the party said the PNP and Golding did not waiver in a commitment to restore the ecological balance of the river through the restocking initiative despite experiencing delays regarding the authorisation process from the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) and other relevant authorities.

But the NFA, in a press release on Saturday, sought to clarify that only the bauxite company had received approval to restock the river and further that only UC Rusal and other competent authorities were involved in the exercise.

Tremendous obstacles

However, the PNP on Sunday insisted that it had obtained permission and had restocked the river with fish obtained on its behalf.

Bunting, in a video, said he initiated the process to acquire and restock the river after he was engaged by Golding last July.

While accumulating thousands of fish, he said Golding faced tremendous obstacles in getting the requisite approval from the NFA and the NEPA.

But after several months of waiting, the fisherman said he eventually sold some of the fish to UC Rusal, and when he was informed that the company had got approval, sent 3,000 fish from the batch he had accumulated for the party along with the ones he had for the company to restock during the exercise.

According to Bunting, he is now surprised to hear that he cannot release the rest of the fish he has for the PNP.

The party also released a statement yesterday in which it noted that Bunting had had months of discussion with government and UC Rusal officials, which culminated in him being told about the approval.

The party said Lenroy Jones, its spokesperson on land and environment, had attended the restocking exercise and had actively participated.

Golding, when asked yesterday to clarify the party’s position in light of the NFA’s statement, said: “The party played a role by initiating the approach to Mr Bunting and thereafter making several approaches to NEPA and Fisheries from August last year.”

He added that his understanding was that Bunting and the relevant agencies had been having discussions over the last two to three months, which culminated in Bunting advising him that they had agreed to start the restocking on Friday.

However, UC Rusal’s senior information and public affairs officer, Monique Grange, said yesterday that she was not aware of the PNP playing any role in the restocking or whether Jones had been present for the restocking exercise.

According to Grange, she needed to seek further information to confirm if the party was indeed involved and also whether Bunting had had discussions with persons from the company.

Meanwhile, the Jamaica Environment Trust (JET), which has expressed shock over the manner in which the restocking was done, said it still has concerns arising from the excercise and has called for transparency.

JET chief executive Theresa Rodriguez-Moodie, in a release, questioned whether an ecological assessment to inform the restocking exercise had taken place as well as the species and number of fish or if other organisms were also added back to the river.

She also indicated that the NEPA has ignored repeated requests for information on the ecological assessment that was to be done by the agency.

Rodriguez-Moodie further highlighted that the fisherfolk in the area were not engaged or guided on the process and described the oversight as unacceptable.

The NFA, in its release, said that an environmental expert was engaged by WINDALCO and carried out extensive research prior to the commencement of the restocking activity.

Furthermore, it stated that the restocking process was guided by extensive consultation with the community, its technical staff, the NEPA, and WINDALCO.

It also shared that in excess of 8,000 Tilapia seedstock were introduced to the Rio Cobre, over 4,000 seedstock were introduced in the vicinity of Flat Bridge, and over 4,000 seedstock were introduced at the Rio Pedro tributary in the vicinity of the Bog Walk bridge.

According to the authority, a condition of the permit is that an environmental freshwater expert be engaged to undertake environmental assessments prior to, during, and after the restocking activity.

In the meantime, it said that fish at the fingerling stage would reach maturity within four to six months while the younger fry would reach maturity in eight to 10 months.

“This means that by December, the fishing community will be able to harvest fish from the restocked population,” it said.

Rodruiguez-Moodie, when contacted yesterday, said the agency remained confused and was still left with several questions.

“The confusion is that in November 2022, NEPA was allocated a sum of $15 million to complete the ecological assessment, so what we want to know is if two assessments were done, one by NEPA and one by WINDALCO, or was the money that was allocated to N EPA given to WINDALCO to do the assessment?” she said.

The JET CEO also wants to know whether WINDALCO had done an environmental or ecological assessment.

Additionally, she said the agency wants to know when the assessments would be published on the NEPA or the NFA’s website.

“Because since Tilapia is an invasive species in Jamaica, we want to find out how they decided to select this one, and did they do an overall health of the river and the major health impact.

“I think further information is needed because I don’t think it provides sufficient clarity. We are of the view that if the Government had honoured their commitment that they made in 2022 to be transparent, I don’t think we would have this much level of confusion,” she added, noting that the agency was also not sure about the role played by the PNP.

“Like others, we are a little confused. Each party is claiming that they have done the restocking. The permit is given to only one person. It’s just murky,” Rodriguez-Moodie said. “We need some clarification.”

tanesha.mundle@gleanerjm.com