Forests Critical to Clean, Safe Water Supply

The Forestry Department is playing a key role in safeguarding the country’s forests, which are vital in sustaining watersheds and ensuring access to clean, fresh, water resources for both human and ecological needs.

Forests contribute to water regulation, soil conservation, water-quality maintenance, biodiversity conservation, climate resilience, and carbon sequestration, among other things.

Chief Executive Officer of the Forestry Department and Conservator of Forests, Ainsley Morris, said the entity manages 117,000 hectares of forests across the island.

The Department’s work is guided by instruments such as the National Forest Management and Conservation Plan, the National Mangrove and Swamp Forest Management Plan and the Clustered Forest Management Plan.

Mr. Morris was speaking at the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation’s virtual townhall on the Draft Watershed Policy on Tuesday, July 18.

The Conservator of Forests informed that the Department has identified six forest cover categories in Jamaica – closed broadleaf forests, disturbed broadleaf forests, mangrove forests and open dry forests.

He said that the parishes with the most forest cover are Portland, St. Catherine, St. Ann and Trelawny, “which also coincides with the location of our largest forest reserves such as the Blue Mountain and the recently declared Cockpit Country Protected Area”.

These areas, he noted, are the most prolific in terms of production of water, the monitoring of which is being done by the Water Resources Authority (WRA).

For his part, Deputy Managing Director of the WRA, Geoffrey Marshall, pointed out that “of the 26 watershed management units that are in Jamaica, in terms of what the WRA monitors, the greatest flows are from the Rio Bueno, White River or Dry Harbour Mountains basins”.

Importantly, he noted that “each of these basins have multiple watersheds within them”, improving our water quality, reducing the risk of flooding, reducing risk for invasive species to establish and increasing resilience within a changing climate.