UNEP IWEco Project – Georgetown watershed management area

Project Summary

The Georgetown Watershed management area on Saint Vincent encompasses some 5,750 ha (22.2 square miles), including the drainage basins of the (a) Byera River, (b) Congo Valley river, and Jennings river, which merge midway to form Grand Sable river, that flows to the coast, (c) Caratal river and Perseverance river and (d) the Langley Park river.  The Georgetown community was severely impacted by Hurricane Tomas in October 2010 and destructive floods associated with an extreme rain event in April 2011 and trough systems in December 2013, 2015, and 2016.  The watershed has also been undergoing gradual degradation, mainly associated with agricultural development.  In the upper-most reaches of the watershed, the illicit cultivation of marijuana is contributing to the problem.  Pig rearing has been increasing particularly in the Jennings/Congo valley with six production units established.  Pens are located directly on the banks of the rivers where the untreated effluent is discharged directly into the adjacent watercourse posing environmental and human health hazards downstream.  Effluent discharged directly into the mouth of the Perseverance River by St Vincent Distillers is creating a nuisance to the community and impacting the aquatic biodiversity downstream.  The watershed area falls within a national biodiversity hotspot, which is home to several rare and threatened species, most significantly the endemic St Vincent Parrot (Amazona guildingii), a national flagship for conservation in the country, and five endemic reptiles.

The project, mainly under the land degradation focal area, will target reforestation and conservation forestry interventions over at least 7.5 hectares within upland areas where landslides have occurred and along some 1.8 km of riverbank that continues to actively erode.  Approximately 10 hectares of farmland were affected by the flood event of April 2011; at least 2 hectares of the most severely degraded area will be reclaimed using a range of soil stabilization and forest management techniques.  This area will be used to demonstrate best practices and as a learning centre for sustainable land management practices.  It is expected that some 15 to 20 farm holdings will be positively impacted, bringing these lands back into productive potential in the medium to long term.  A sub-component of the project will be to carry out thinning in Hibiscus elastus (Blue Mahoe) and Swietenia mahagoni Mahagony forest plantations located at Perseverance over approximately 5 hectares.  This intervention will also improve the stability of the existing forest plantation and enhance the diversity of the forest, through the natural regeneration of indigenous forest tree species. This will further increase the habit of the endemic St. Vincent Parrot, resulting in increase of the population..   The thinnings will be sold to demonstrate the financial viability of improved husbandry.

Despite the significant erosion and scaring of the landscapes within the watershed, natural regeneration has occurred in degraded areas, comprising pioneer species as well as localized species of Galba, locus, fiddlewood, etc. Notwithstanding the natural succession, there is a clear distinction between these patches of shrubbery and surrounding stands of mature forest, untouched by the disasters. Enrichment planting of naturalized species will be done on approximately 2 hectares of the 7.5 hectares to stabilize the already unstable soil, as well as to increase the biodiversity within the secondary forest.

Several access roads to the watershed as well as the major water catchment in the area have been damaged due to the combined floods of 2011,2013, 2015, and 2016. In the 2016 floods, portions of the road were cut off completely and a temporary diversion was done subsequently, to restore access to the watershed. Currently, there are large fissures in the asphalt surface layer and portions of the dirt road are overgrown with weeds. The project will assist with the rehabilitation of the road allowing access to workers to carry out silvicultural interventions in the watershed to further promote soil and water conservation in the area.

The project will also target the reduction of direct discharges of pig effluent into the environment through the employment of dry manure techniques. This assistance to the livestock farmers will build on the good agricultural practices program of the Ministry of Agriculture. The project will contribute to the development of the Jennings Bird Watching Trail; an upgrade to an existing forest patrol trail that has the potential to be a significant revenue earner for the community given the avian diversity and uniqueness in the upper watershed as well as the outstanding aesthetic appeal of the environment.  The trail upgrade will result in spin-off benefits to the community through jobs linked to the provision of services, accommodation, trail guiding, and retail of indigenous local branded souvenirs.  The GEF Small Grants Programme will support at least one community group in the Georgetown area to take advantage of the economic potential associated with the implementation of the project.

While the direct project interventions in sustainable land and forestry management will be over approximately 15 hectares, the entire watershed over 5,750 hectares will be managed as a unit within the scope of the project. Fifty hectares of the forest protected will directly benefit ecotourism.  It is expected that the active SLM interventions to reduce the rate of upland degradation and restore the integrity of riparian ecosystems will lead to benefits within the wider watershed through in-situ conservation.  Through on-site land and forest cover investments within 15 hectares over the target watershed areas, it is expected that an estimated 1,403.3 equivalent tonnes of CO₂ over the life of the project, or an average of 280.7 tCO₂eqv/year will be sequestered.

The project will also implement a census of the St. Vincent parrot (Amazona guildingii), endemic to the island of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and one of the rarest and most magnificent parrot species globally. The parrot’s populations have suffered a decline through the 20th century until the early 1980s. Following recent conservation action and public awareness, numbers increased from 370-470 individuals in 1982 to approximately 519 in 2002, and then to 734 in 2004 (Greenwood 1994, Culzac-Wilson et al. 2003, Wege D. in litt. 2005). According to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species website, the current population stands at approximately 730 birds (Loro Parque Fundación 2008). Despite the increasing populations, due to the limited size of its home island, human impacts on the habitat, and natural disasters, the Amazona guildingii retains its status as vulnerable under the IUCN Red List.

A series of public awareness strategies will be implemented to build on the work of conservationists in the early 1900s. In collaborations with the private sector and educational institutions, a suite of information products, activities, and events will be implemented. Public awareness and outreach products, as well as knowledge management products, will be created and lessons learned and good practices documented, for dissemination towards replication in other ecological hotspots. These include but are not limited to branding of flagship endemic species on bottled water extracted from the watershed, social media promotions, environmental music videos, and a St Vincent Environment Music Festival, stage play, mascot, media awareness workshop, forestry summer programs, interpretative signs along nature trails and school awareness campaign.

https://www.iweco.org/countries/saint-vincent-the-grenadines