THE NEW CReW project is to take lessons learnt from the last effort, while building on its gains, in pursuit of better wastewater management in the Caribbean.

According to Chris Corbin, programme officer for the pollution and communications subprogrammes with the Ecosystems Division of UNEP, co-executors of the current and former project, while satisfied with the outputs of CReW, there is much that remains to be done if the challenges to effective wastewater management are to be overcome.

Through this earlier project, 13 countries of the wider Caribbean region benefited from capacity building and the development of innovative sustainable financing solutions for the wastewater sector,” he noted.

Those gains also included the ratification of the Cartagena Convention’s Land-Based Sources of Marine Pollution (LBS) Protocol by Jamaica (November 2015) and Costa Rica (May 2016); as well as access to improved wastewater treatment by over 37,000 people, or some 8,400 households.

However, in demonstrating one of the ways in which they had derived lessons learnt, Corbin said: “The funds were greater but important to highlight is that under CReW+, funds are more equitably distributed and all of the participating countries will be supported to have activities on the ground and focus more on wastewater improvements at a community level targeting vulnerable populations.”