KINGSTON, Jamaica — Residents of the Cockpit Country communities are voicing their objection to continuing bauxite mining and prospecting activities near to the designated Cockpit Country Protected Area (CCPA).

At a meeting with representatives of the Government of Jamaica and the bauxite industry in Kingston on Thursday, October 25, community leaders from the Cockpit Country and civil society groups reiterated their position that there should be no mining within or near the boundary of CCPA.

The Cockpit Country stakeholder meeting was hosted by the Jamaica Environment Trust (JET), through its ‘Advancing the Protection of Jamaica’s Cockpit Country’ project, a release from JET said.

Chairman of the Gibraltar All Age School in St Ann, Bishop Robert Clarke, expressed grave concern about the health impacts dust from the bauxite mining is having on students and teachers at the school.

“There are open bauxite pits in the area measuring over 100 feet deep. We are afraid for the safety of our children as they travel to and from school past these pits,” he added.

Linsford Hamilton, a resident of Madras in St Ann also pointed to the impact mining will have on agriculture.

“This is not just about farming in St Ann,” he said. “Mining in this area will impact food supply for the entire country. We want no bauxite mining or prospecting in or around Cockpit Country.”

Cockpit Country community leaders present at the meeting also raised concerns about the impact bauxite mining has on rainwater catchment and underground water resources, sentiments which were echoed by Dr Susan Koenig, Director of Research at the Windsor Research Centre in Trelawny.

In her presentation to the meeting Koenig illustrated how removal of soil by bauxite mining would affect the ability of Cockpit Country to act as a water reservoir.

“The proposed Cockpit Country Protected Area boundary does not protect all the water resources of Cockpit Country,” said Dr Koenig.

“The government should not be allowing any activity in the area which will affect the quality and quantity of water stored in the Cockpit Country aquifer; it becomes increasingly important as we observe changes in rainfall patterns associated with Climate Change. We must protect Jamaica’s resilience to Climate Change,” she said.

The Cockpit Country is said to account for 40 per cent of western Jamaica’s water resources.

Koenig, JET and other civil society representatives including Cockpit Country community groups are advocating that the Government should establish a buffer zone around the CCPA to ensure that important groundwater reserves in and around Cockpit Country remain intact; activities which will damage the natural environment, important cultural and historical sites, and local livelihoods should be restricted within the buffer zone.

These restrictions would include, but not be limited to mining and prospecting. Several of the communities represented at the meeting – Madras and Gibraltar in St Ann, Kensington and Cambridge in St James, and Elderslie in St Elizabeth, lay very near or just outside the CCPA boundary and remain adamant that their exclusion from the designated protected area should not exclude their communities from protection from mining.