MARINE LIFE PROTECTION IN JAMAICA?

Erica Anne Hamilton, who has been working to have a dolphin pen permit for Discovery Bay revoked posted a condensed version of what she found. Compared to the rest of Jamaica, Discovery Bay is well protected. Still, it's impossible to make head or tail of what that actually means. NEPA, which is the organization that government relies on to set the agenda for coastal management, is neither structurally sound nor even able to minimally serve as an agency of sane coastal governance.

As to St. Ann's Bay, an online search for laws governing its coast turned up nothing at all. This could be a good reason to propose a coastal management district for St. Ann parish's coast, and ask its educational institutions to help with the research to make it happen.

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A SNIPPET OF WHAT ERICA FOUND, RELATED TO DISCOVERY BAY

(5) Wild Life Protection Act 1945 (6) The Natural Resources Conservation Authority (NRCA) Act 1991 - marine parks and protected areas

There have been numerous other Green Papers and Draft Policies that have not been enacted, including the Dolphin Policy of 2003 which I understand was placed before the house in February 2018.

According to the Caribbean Research Policy Institute (CaPRI) In 2001, the three main regulatory bodies, the Natural Resources and Conservation Authority (NRCA), the Town and Country Planning Authority and the Development and Land Development and Utilisation Commission were merged to create NEPA. However, the Act that established the NRCA was never repealed and the new NEPA Act was never promulgated. They say that means that NEPA is operating under multiple laws that pre-date the organisation with no legislation giving it legal authority to actually enforce any of these regulations.

We are not alone. A study as long ago as 2010 by Aliza M. Cohen of the University of Michigan Law School made a very detailed analysis of the very same shortcomings, albeit in the framework of US law.

The most pertinent document I have found, in terms of our own Discovery Bay, is The Discovery Bay Special Fishery Conservation Area Management Plan, 2015 – 2025.

It begins with a brief recent history of the bay as it relates to fishing, that it had been overfished, economically, and biologically, talks about pollutants, sediments, global warming, and the increasing strength and frequency of hurricanes. The Bay was declared a Fish Sanctuary in 2009; in 2012 this voluntary designation was revoked and replaced by the Special Fishery Conservation Area Regulations, no longer voluntary but a strict no fishing zone with statutory and legal status, to try to return fish populations to a sustainable level focusing additionally on issues that affect the bay and on conservation of habitats. This Management plan was supplemented by an Action Plan, a Business Plan and a Training Plan, published under separate covers and I have not seen those. The implementation of this management plan is an obligation of the Fisheries Division and they signed an MOU with the Discovery Bay Alloa Fishermen's Association to help on a day-to-day basis, with management.