Caption: Seaweed covering the coastline in Guayaguayare this week. Photo: Sue-Ann Wayow
By Sue-Ann Wayow
BEACH goers intending to visit the beaches along Trinidad’s eastern coastline during weekends and for the upcoming Carnival weekend may have to contend with sargassum seaweed.
But Chairman of the Mayaro/Rio Claro Regional Corporation Raymond Cozier is giving the assurance that the major beaches will be cleaned up for them.
He told AZP News on Friday, that while the corporation was not responsible for the actual beaches, it takes on the responsibility of cleaning the areas because Mayaro was a popular destination on weekends and holidays.
“We owe it to our visitors and to our residents,” Cozier said.
Given the enormity of the seaweed at times, the main spots in Plaisance, Church Road, Ortoire, Indian Bay, Grand Lagoon and others were given priority.
Cozier said, “At times it is enormous, it is a lot. So, what we do, we focus on cleaning the areas that are heavily populated with beach goers. From next week, for the Carnival, government has agreed to send more teams to Mayaro to assist in whatever way they could.”
He said, “Those heavy amount of sargassum need equipment so we are battling that right now. Sometimes it is really terrible. We would clean today and overnight the same amount is back on the same spot again. It is a daily exercise at times.”
The current methodology to clear the seaweed is to use a backhoe to scrape up the seaweed and pack it further on the land where it eventually just deteriorates, Cozier explained.
He did reveal that government was working towards a new project to better dispose of the seaweed which involved stockpiling at a place already identified in Guayaguayare.
The stockpiled seaweed will then be moved out using trucks.
A foreign agency is involved and he said equipment from that agency was expected to arrive soon.
Last year August, sargassum equipment was donated by Japan to the Ministry of Rural Development and Local Government. A ceremony marked the official handover of keys to two specialised tractors, procured under the Project for Improving National Sargassum Management Capacities in the Caribbean.
Since 2011, sargassum seaweed has been increasingly showing up on the shorelines of Trinidad and Tobago. Along the eastern coast of Trinidad, it is prevalent usually during the first few months of the year and especially for the Easter long weekend.
