The Green Economy in Trinidad

Dramatically shifting weather patterns and the increased frequency of powerful storms continue to whip up debate about climate change.

For the Caribbean, the symptoms of climate change are particularly menacing. Islands in the region face the threat of sea level rise. In Trinidad and Tobago, there are few places of human habitation that aren’t flood prone. We often find ourselves at the mercy of flash floods after only 30 minutes of rain.

Even as the conversation on climate change rages on, several countries are aggressively trying to develop a ‘green economy’. In China, where there is ever-growing demand for energy to prop up a mushrooming economy and expanding consumer appetites, this emerging superpower is investing in renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. On the African continent, Uganda is spreading the gospel of organic farming, dramatically reducing harmful inputs like pesticides.

CEPEP takes on ‘greening’

Here in T&T, we are adopting our own brand of ‘greening’.

The CEPEP Company Limited has long been linked to environmental protection. It’s right there in the name - The Community-Based Environmental Protection and Enhancement Programme. This, however, goes far beyond a name or prevailing perceptions of what CEPEP is or does.

The concept of the green economy, as expressed through CEPEP, can be found in countless communities across Trinidad. A visit to the village of Lopinot in the northern part of the island provides a good example.

The Lopinot Valley is a good example of the green economy at work

This verdant valley is beautified further by the consistent input of CEPEP gangs trimming road verges, pushing back rebellious growth and reducing the hazards of blind corners along a very narrow road.

A battalion of green overall-ed residents descends on the river traversing this scenic community, clearing up the detritus of raucous weekend limes and riverside ‘cook ups’. On sandy river banks, countless bags of garbage are lined up, all collected by CEPEP workers for disposal.

Healthy environment, healthy revenue

Not seeing the green economy in this scenario yet? Well, Lopinot is an important tourist destination, revered not just for its riveting historical sites but the latent eco-tourism potential resident in its forests.

The sweat equity of the CEPEP worker helps to maintain the Lopinot tourism product, and, in so doing, supports the local business community.

CEPEP workers help keep the Lopinot tourism product in tip top shape

Visitors from at home and abroad, eager to sample what Lopinot has to offer, funnel critical support to small businesses in the community. They come, they frolic, buy food and drink. They may even collapse into a bed for a night or two at a guest house. It is this tourism revenue that allows residents to benefit directly from using their most precious resource, the environment, in a sustainable manner.

It is highly unlikely that visitors would find Lopinot a desirable location if they were confronted by hillocks of rubbish and rivers and streams smothered with gleefully discarded bottles.

Lopinot illustrates how CEPEP functions as an investment in development which has at its core environmental conservation. Outsiders may leave the place in a mess but CEPEP is always there to ensure that Lopinot, as an economic commodity inextricably tied to environmental preservation, will always attract fair market value.

As a small island acutely subject to increasingly capricious weather patterns attributed to global warming, we must wean ourselves off petrochemical dependency and diversify our economy. The work of The CEPEP Company Limited is an immensely important component in T&T’s march towards a green economy.   

A Lifeline for our Towns and Villages

The sun peeks over modest hills in the North Coast village of Grande Riviere. Fishermen are hauling their gear up on the beach having just returned from a long night trawling the rolling depths. It is 6:00am and their bones and backs are weary.

As morning light inches its way across the land, farmers are already out in force, tending their crops before the sun’s fierce sting beats them back into the shade. They aren’t the only ones out to work.

An intermittent mechanized buzzing rises and falls with gusting coastal breezes. This is the rowdy rhapsody of CEPEP equipment taming the undergrowth on forest-darkened country roads. CEPEP crews advance so steadily along the winding roads and plunging gullies that you might not even see them. All that lingers is the smell of fresh cut grass and the work left in their wake.

An early bird CEPEP worker

CEPEP and the multiplier effect
This far flung community was born an agricultural settlement. In the mid-to-late 1800s at the coronation of cocoa, Grande Riviere cultivated this lucrative crop, attracting those with soil in their veins from as far as Venezuela. With the decline of the cocoa industry, though, the fortunes of this rustic community shifted dramatically.

Today, subsistence farming and fishing continue on as important occupations for residents. The CEPEP programme has, however, become a significant element of life in this rugged coastal outpost.

Small, colourful ‘parlours’ punctuate the narrow road snaking its way through Grande Riviere. They appear like bamboo stands on a river bank. In no small measure, it is the purchasing power of CEPEP workers, humble folks able to earn their living neither in the sea nor soil, that sustains the pulse of family-run mini-marts and shops.

Giving hope to new generations

If you take a closer look at the CEPEP worker, it’s easy to see how profoundly the programme touches people in countryside communities. The majority of these workers are single mothers. CEPEP is a valuable social intervention which allows these women flexible working hours not readily offered in other places.

Women make up a large part of the CEPEP workforce

A mother can see her children off to school at the bus stop, pick up an early morning shift, meet her charges as they are released from classes in the afternoon and put food on the table for them; food purchased with a CEPEP wage. These children are free to focus on their studies with crucial parental guidance. Armed with an education, these children represent a break in the cycle of poverty.

Thanks to the intervention of the CEPEP programme, new generations liberated from socio-economic difficulties give rural communities real hope for the future.

CEPEP provides much needed jobs in towns and villages where public and private sector work is scarce. It affords income-earning opportunities to areas almost severed from the rest of society by virtue of distance.

The sun sets on another day in Grande Riviere. A mother whispers her children to sleep after they’ve completed their homework, homework she never had a chance to do as a child. She can rest her head knowing that, for her children, the future will be different. They won’t have to travel the road of struggle and disappointment she faced in her youth.

This is the promise that The CEPEP Company Limited gives to those struggling to find direction in life. It is a doorway to hope and a chance at a better life.

Guardians of our Marine Spaces

Uniformly green flat-bottom boats sway lazily on the risen tide, tugging gently at their rope leashes. The brackish murk of a man-made canal laps at the bank where a gaggle of tourists is gathered.

This is the Caroni Bird Sanctuary in Trinidad, perhaps the best known eco-tourism destination in the country. It is also home to the national bird, the scarlet ibis.It’s why these visitors are here, fussing with cameras and backpacks, enveloping themselves in a fog of insect repellent before gingerly boarding open-air boats which will ferry them down a green corridor into the unknown.

The flotilla motors slowly into the swamp, the guides keep a sharp eye out for anything of interest.

“If you look to your left you will see something tangled in that tree. We call it a cascabel. It is a tree dwelling snake.” Just as the guide directs the attention of the excited boat passengers to the coiled snake, a flock of scarlet ibis flies over a gap in the mangrove growth.

Scarlet Ibis returning to roost in the Caroni Swamp

“And if you look up quickly you will see our national bird.” Everyone’s eyes are now skyward, eager hands fumble at cameras and binoculars and a chorus of oohs and aahs rises from the tour party. As they look back down, something else in the swamp catches their attention, trapped in the tangle of mangrove roots, it’s….what can it be?

Pollution in the Caroni Swamp

Closer inspection uncloaks the mystery, the rusted carcass of an old washing machine. A hush falls on the boat, puzzled looks work their way across the faces of the visitors. The boats drift slowly past a majestic blue heron perched atop a Dell computer monitor.

These travellers came from far and wide to venture into the Caroni Swamp. There are countless wonderful things to see in this diverse habitat. The image that will probably be shared the most, however, is that picture of a bird…standing on a computer…in a swamp. Not an ideal postcard, given that the Caroni Bird Sanctuary is billed as one of the most important eco-tourism sites in Trinidad and Tobago.

Thankfully, that sort of imagery is increasingly rare today in this treasured wetland. The advent of the CEPEP Marine programme has dramatically changed the appearance of the swamp.

At the crack of dawn each morning, CEPEP crews arrive for the daily routine of combing the swamp for society’s waste. At the end of each day, roughly 60 to 80 bags of garbage are collected. That is quite the haul. From discarded fans to microwaves, you name it, they find it.

A CEPEP Marine crew offloads their haul for the day

Protecting wetlands and coastlines

Recognizing the urgent need to remove these pollutants from riverine and coastal environments, CEPEP Marine was born. Crews scour the coastline for waste of every imaginable size and shape; from the Western Peninsula all the way down to South Trinidad, the scope of this programme is vast. 

Contractors average a monthly tally of 6,000 bags of garbage. In fact, since the programme started in 2012, 210,000 bags of garbage have been collected by CEPEP Marine teams. Now that is a staggering statistic!

The benefits of CEPEP Marine, widely felt in many communities across the country, are perhaps best reflected in the Caroni Bird Sanctuary.

A day’s worth of work in the Caroni Swamp

The appropriate disposal of garbage will involve a process of education over time to change inherited bad habits. In the meantime, CEPEP marine delivers a consistent, invaluable service where no other agency, public or private, dares to tread.

In the Caroni Swamp and elsewhere in Trinidad, the importance of this ground-breaking initiative is undeniable.