Director of the Centre for Resource Management and Environmental Studies (CERMES) at The University of the West Indies (UWI) Dr Patrick McConney says that Caribbean countries must be prepared for an influx of sargassum that is likely to continue for some time.
McConney made the disclosure at yesterday’s virtual launch of CERMES ‘SargAdopt Project’ under the theme ‘Adapting to a New Reality: Managing Responses to Influxes of Sargassum Seaweed in the Eastern Caribbean as Ecosystem Hazards and Opportunities’.
The SargAdopt Project is an initiative of the Caribbean Biodiversity Fund Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EBA) Facility, with financing from the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the German Federal Ministry for Environment, Nature Conservation, and Nuclear Safety through KfW, a German state-owned development bank.
“Really we want to see these influxes as opportunities, and that lies beyond some of the research that CERMES will be doing and very much with partners who are around the Caribbean and around the globe assisting in this very important approach to sargassum research,” he said.
Its primary objective is to reduce the impact of and improve adaptation to sargassum influxes in the Eastern Caribbean.
