Tractors have already begun clearing parts of Trinidad's Orange Grove Savannah watershed for a sporting complex. Credit: Peter Richards/IPS

By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Oct 7 2013 (IPS)

Trinidad’s Orange Grove Savannah sits at the foothills of the Northern Range, whose watersheds provide copious volumes of fresh water into the aquifers – natural underground water storage areas – lying below these green spaces.

“This natural savannah plays a key ecological function in reducing flooding to surrounding communities, as surface waters are absorbed through grass fields into the aquifer providing a 24/7 water supply to thousands of households in east Trinidad,” Dr. Carol James, a retired United Nations policy advisor who specialised in sustainable development, told IPS."We have to do a simple thing and go in front of the tractors and let them run us over." -- Prof. Selwyn Cudjoe

James says plans by the government to build a multi-million-dollar sporting complex there “would spell disaster” for an area which many view as the lungs and principal water source of East Trinidad.

“Indeed, it is the only uncontaminated set of aquifers of this size anywhere along the east-west corridor responsible for supplying water needs of significant communities,” she said.

James added that nearby Aranguez “has already been contaminated with saltwater and pesticides due to a lack of critical planning in that ecologically sensitive water-storage area.”

The Orange Grove Savannah has served as a major sport and recreational space for an estimated 250,000 residents of Tacarigua and nearby communities for more than 125 years.

Peter Burke, chair of a group called Save our Green Space, told IPS, “London has its Hyde Park, New York its Central Park and Port of Spain its Queens Park Savannah. Orange Grove Savannah represents an oasis and mecca for hundreds of persons daily.”

In recent years, local residents have watched the savannah dwindle from its original 125 acres to 39, with the construction of several sporting facilities and private homes.

James said significant development in greater Tacarigua over the last 50 years has caused occasional serious flooding as the capacity of the savannah’s aquifer to absorb rapid runoff of water from roads, roofs and driveways has been compromised.

“Thousands of roofs shed water more rapidly than through vegetation, but with the existence of the savannah the severity of flooding disasters has been minimised,” she said.

“The community needs to understand, appreciate and protect this rich natural inheritance if its quality of life is to continue,” she told IPS.

Sports Minister Anil Roberts defends the decision to construct the community sporting complex, insisting that the project would actually enhance the green space.

“This facility is going to serve over 200,000 citizens,” he said on a recent television programme, denying that consultations were not held with the community.

Roberts said that the thousands of residents who signed a petition against the project had been misled by James and others because they were not told that what was being constructed would “enhance their sporting facilities and their family lives”.

“I would sign something that says do not take away my green space. It is not taking away anything,” Roberts said, noting that the project at Tacariqua is one of nine to be constructed across the country.

Meetings involving Save our Green Space, the Sports Company of Trinidad and Tobago and Minister Roberts have so far failed to forge a compromise.

“We are not opposed to this project at all but we are opposed to the site, given the history, given the impact it is going to have,” Burke insists. “We have a mandate from the residents of the area.”

Selwyn Cudjoe, a prominent lecturer and historian based in the U.S., is also vehemently opposed to the project.

“My family and I have lived all of our lives in Tacarigua,” he told IPS. “My great-grandfather, Jonathan Cudjoe, and my great grandmother, Amelia Cudjoe, were born in Tacarigua in 1833 and 1837, respectively. This means that my family has been a part of this community even before slavery ended.

“As a scholar, I have devoted my entire life to documenting the importance of Tacarigua and its savannah to the village, the country, and the world,” he said.

In 1995, to mark the 350th anniversary of Tacarigua’s founding as a village, Cudjoe wrote the book “Tacarigua: A Village in Trinidad” arguing “about the importance of our common green space that is so necessary for the mental, physical, and aesthetic development of our people.

“We have had many fights to maintain our green spaces,” Cudjoe told IPS.

“We are saying we do not want this and the government is saying in spite of what we say, they are our bosses. Then we have to do a simple thing and go in front of the tractors and let them run us over,” he said.

Protecting natural watershed areas is considered a sustainable and cost-effective approach to ensuring a supply of potable water. Above, the Ashokan Reservoir in New York state. Credit: ScubaBear68/CC by 2.0

By Stephen Leahy
UXBRIDGE, Canada, Jan 18 2013 (IPS)

After Hurricane Sandy swept through the northeast of the United States late October 2012, millions of New Yorkers were left for days without electricity.  But they still had access to drinking water, thanks to New York City’s reliance on protected watershed areas for potable water.

Instead of using electric-powered water treatment plans, New York City brings its high-quality drinking water through aqueducts connected to protected areas in the nearby Catskill/Delaware forests and wetlands – just one example of how protecting watersheds can provide residential areas with drinking water and flood and pollution protection at bargain basement prices.

New York saved between four and six billion dollars on the cost of water treatment plants by protecting forests and compensating farmers in the Catskills for reducing pollution in lakes and streams.

In 2011, countries around the world invested more than eight billion dollars in similar watershed projects around the world, according to the State of Watershed Payments 2012 report released Thursday. That year, China led the way, accounting for 91 percent of watershed investment.

“Whether you need to save water-starved China from economic ruin or protect drinking water for New York City, investing in natural resources is emerging as the most cost-efficient and effective way to secure clean water and recharge our dangerously depleted streams and aquifers,” said Michael Jenkins, president of Forest Trends, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) in the United States, which compiled the report.

Previous studies have shown that pollution, the building of dams, agricultural runoff, conversion of wetlands, and waterworks engineering have severely affected global river systems. The wealthier the country, the bigger the threat to river systems, primarily because of expensive waterworks engineering, according to the first-ever health assessment of river ecosystems around the world, as previously reported by IPS.

Promoting a new approach

Given the water engineering mentality of the 1990s, it wasn’t easy to convince health and safety officials that a “green waterworks” approach would work for New York City, said Genevieve Bennett, lead author of the Watershed Payments report and a research analyst with Ecosystem Marketplace.

But trees, grasses and plants are extremely effective at cleaning and retaining water, as well as reducing sedimentation that clogs water reservoirs, Bennett told IPS. “The benefits from these watershed programs extend far beyond water: they support biodiversity, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and provide income for the rural poor,” she said.

In watershed protection programs such as those in New York, farmers are paid to use soil and water conservation techniques – payment for good stewardship that benefits the public, Bennett added.

Government regulations, however, remain a major constraint to similar projects in many countries. New York’s well documented and highly successful strategy has not been emulated by many other cities, including those in China or India, where engineering expertise is highly prized and huge engineering works are a matter of national pride.

Investing in sustaining existing ecosystems is better than destroying them and attempting to engineer solutions, Charles Vörösmarty, an expert on global water resources, previously told IPS. Water management costs will skyrocket if developing countries adopt the approach of developed nations, he added.

China is one country that has begun to change its approach, according to the report. About 108,000 residents in struggling communities upstream of the southern coastal city of Zhuhai are receiving new health insurance benefits in exchange for adopting land management practices to improve drinking water in the region.

“There are lots of different ways watershed investments are being made in China, some good and some bad. There’s lots of learning happening,” said Bennett.

Beginning of change

In Latin America, the trend in water programs is to offer compensation other than cash for protecting water resources. In Bolivia’s Santa Cruz valley, for example, more than 500 families receive beehives, fruit plants and wire, which can be used for fencing to keep livestock away from rivers and stream banks, in return for their water protection efforts.

A Swedish local water authority found it cheaper to pay for a program to establish blue mussel beds in Gullmar Fjord to filter nitrate pollution than to build a new treatment facility on shore. In Uganda, a beer brewer is paying for the protection of wetlands to retain their valuable capacity to maintain a steady and abundant supply of clean water.

The vast majority of investments in watersheds are with public money. The private sector still thinks providing good quality water is up to governments, Bennett said. However, the public sector is unlikely to be able to invest the 17.7 trillion dollars needed for water infrastructure by 2030, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

A green infrastructure is by far the cheaper option and provides a host of other benefits, Bennett concluded.