Volunteers Remove Plastic Waste from Fisherman’s and Dead-End Beaches
By: , June 12, 2023
Photo: Natalia Dixon
Executive Director of the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA), Audley Gordon (second from left), assists a volunteer in weighing a bag of plastic waste, which was removed from Dead End Beach in St. James during World Oceans Day clean up on Thursday (June 8). Other volunteers wait to weight bags of garbage. The day’s activities, which included clean up of the Fisherman’s Beach, was spearheaded by WPM Waste Management Limited.
Photo: Natalia Dixon
Herbert Morrison Technical High School student volunteer, Prudent Salmon, paints environmentally-conscious messages on a garbage container during World Oceans Day clean up on Thursday (June 8), at Dead End Beach in St. James.
Photo: Natalia Dixon
Volunteer divers from Sandals Resort, display bags of garbage collected underwater, during World Oceans Day clean up on Thursday (June 8), at Dead End Beach in St. James.The Full Story
Scores of volunteers engaged in cleanup activities at the Fisherman’s and Dead-End beaches in St. James on Thursday (June 8) to mark World Oceans Day.
Community Relations Officer at WPM Waste Management Limited, which spearheaded the day’s exercise, Sharnon Williams, told JIS News that the objective was to remove plastic waste from the beaches and underwater.
Plastics that end up in the ocean break down into small particles called microplastics, which enter the marine food chain and become extremely damaging to sea life.
“While we do see waste on the road, a lot of times we are not knowing that waste actually travels under water. It disrupts ecosystems…and when the garbage is under there we don’t see it but we’re [out] there today to clean up what is under there,” Ms. Williams noted.
Volunteers participating in the exercise included representatives from the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF) Coast Guard, Sandals Resort, Playa Hotel, Jamaica Public Service (JPS), Sustainable Ocean Alliance (SOA), Esirom, Aristo Kats Tours, Montego Bay Marine Park, National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA), Ministry of Health and Wellness (MOHW), Recycling Partners of Jamaica and Secrets Resorts.
The Montego Bay Learning Centre, Herbert Morrison Technical High, Irwin High, Green Pond Primary and Infant, Farm Primary and Infant and the Mount Salem Primary and Infant schools, also supported the initiative.
For his part, Regional Operations Manager, WPM Waste Management Limited, Jermaine Jones, shared that the activities were not only focused on the beach and underwater cleanup, but also public education on the dangers of pollution to aquatic life.
“We are doing this and pushing the message on social media and other media forms so that persons can understand that throwing a bottle in a gully or leaving a plastic bottle at the seaside or even just a biscuit paper, that this has an impact on the overall ecosystem,” he said.
The World Oceans Day clean-up was in keeping with National Environmental Awareness Week from June 4 to 10 under the theme: ‘End Travel Waste.’