Artistes and Communities Combine to Raise Awareness on Biodiversity and Climate Change – Outreach Concert slated for Saturday, April 9, 2011

By Andrea Downer, Journalist

Kingston, Jamaica. April 6, 2011- At least ten local artistes will on Saturday, April 9, team up with the communities of Mocho and Portland Cottage in Clarendon to raise awareness on the need to conserve plants and animals (biodiversity) at risk of extinction as well as planning for climate change.

The two – Mocho: a farming community and Portland Cottage: a coastal community – are a part of a project on communicating climate change and biodiversity. They have combined with the Voices for Climate Change Education Project which has 24 artists involved in public education.

This Saturday’s concert, which will be held at Lennon High School, will focus on climate change as well as biodiversity.  Both communities have concerns about the way in which climate change will impact on the biodiversity there as well as on their livelihoods. Biodiversity can be defined as the balance between plants, animals and humans.

“I learnt from the older generation in Mocho that the area had a lot of medicinal trees, the older folks hardly went to the doctor. There was a cure for every sickness you could imagine. However, now, you can’t find cold bush any more, we can’t find the bush for belly aches, so herbs and bushes like honey weed, thistles and leaf of life is now a thing of the past,” said Vice President of the Mocho Community Development Association (MCDA), Odette Eccles. “Colon mint, a very good mint for cleansing the colon we hardly ever see it any more. Very few people trying to plant back a few of those medicinal bushes to see if they once again can be in the community.”

Veteran Singer, Lloyd Lovindeer helps some school children to plants a tree at their school during a Voices For Climate Change Education Outreach Event in 2010

Mocho, located close to Four Paths in Clarendon, is known for its farming produce and the preservation of the area’s biodiversity is crucial to the future of that economic activity.

Eccles blames the loss of endemic wildlife and the threat to the area’s biodiversity on bauxite mining which took place in the community for more than 30 years. According to her, the activity left them (in Mocho) with a lot of schools and nothing else.

“With the flat lands which used to be used for farming mined out, the farmers have to go to the hills to farm, which further threatens the area’s biodiversity.  Bauxite mining by JAMALCO came into the community in the 1970’s and continued until about 2005,” she disclosed.

She said while workshops and community meetings help to spread the urgent environment message of climate change and the need to preserve the Mocho’s biodiversity, a reggae concert is ideal to reinforce what has been already taught to members of the community.

“People rarely read flyers and posters.  I think music really gets to the people more. When you come to the concert, rock to the beat, listen to the words of the songs; that will have a more lasting impact. Also, the kinds of artistes that will be performing are well known and people will stand up and take notice because of how popular they are,” she said. “People will tend to remember the catchy words from music rather than what is said in workshops or community meetings.”

Voices for Climate Change Artistes performing on stage during a climate Change awareness concert last year (in 2010)

Artistes slated to perform are Lovindeer, One Third, Pam Hall, Cameal Davis, Boom Dawn, Amique and Nazzle Man, Fire Juice, Pampi Judah, Free the Ghetto Youth, Big Pop, Minori and Colah Network.

The concert kicks off at 3pm and goes up to 6pm. A tree planting exercise at Mocho and Brixton Hill Primary school will start the day’s activities at 10 am.

The concert on Saturday is among several activities to be held in Mocho as part of a 15 month project which is an extension of a pilot Voices by Panos Caribbean. This current project has much more of a focus at the community level. It is a collaborative effort between the Mocho Community Development Association (MCDA), Panos Caribbean and the National Environmental Education Committee (NEEC).

The project is being implemented with a US$29,000 grant from the Global Environment Facility Small Grant Programme and the Environmental Foundation of Jamaica to work on communicating climate change and biodiversity issues.

Regional Director, Media, Community & Environment at Panos Caribbean, Indi Mclymont-Lafayette during her presentation during at a one-day workshop on March 29, 2011 on climate change and biodiversity held in Mocho, Clarendon by the Mocho Community Development Association, (MCDA) and Panos Caribbean.

“We have had two workshops so far on climate change and biodiversity since the start of the year and already people in the community are more aware of the issue. They are asking questions about climate change and show a lot of interest in finding out about it,” said Eccles. (End/06/04/11)