BBC
Hurricane Beryl took a toll on the island’s fishing fleet
There are few clearer signs of the destructive power that Hurricane Beryl unleashed on Barbados in July than the scene at the temporary shipyard in the capital, Bridgetown.
Dozens of mangled and cracked ships lie on piles, gaping holes in their hulls, their rudders broken and their cabin windows shattered.
And yet, they were the lucky ones.
At least they can be repaired and returned to the sea. Many others have sunk, taking with them entire family incomes.
When Beryl struck Barbados, the island’s fishing fleet was devastated within hours. Approximately 75% of the active fleet was damaged, with 88 boats totally destroyed.
Charles Carter, owner of a blue and black fishing boat called Joyce, was among those affected.
“It was really bad, I can tell you that. I had to change both sides of the hull, right down to the waterline,” he says, pointing to the now immaculate boat in front of us.
It took months of restoration and thousands of dollars to bring it back to this point, during which time Charles was barely able to fish.
“It’s my livelihood, fishing is all I do,” he says.
“The fishing sector is in disorder,” repeats his friend Captain Euride. “We’re just trying to pick up the pieces.”
Charles Carter has no other means of livelihood than fishing
Now, six months after the storm, signs of calmer waters are appearing. On a hot Saturday, several repaired ships were returned to the ocean with the help of a crane, trailer and government support.
Seeing Joyce back on the water is a welcome sight for all Barbados fishermen.
But Barbadians are keenly aware that climate change means more active and powerful hurricane seasons in the Atlantic – and it may be another year or two before the fishing industry is hit again . Beryl, for example, was the first Category 5 storm on record.
Few understand the scale of the problem better than the island’s director of fisheries, Dr Shelly Ann Cox.
“Our captains informed us that the sea conditions had changed,” she explains. “Stronger swells, much warmer sea surface temperatures and they are having difficulty catching flying fish at the start of the pelagic season.”
A crane was used to return the repaired ships to the sea
The flying fish is a national symbol in Barbados and a key element of the island’s cuisine. But climate change has been harming stocks for years.
At Oistins Fish Market in Bridgetown, flying fish are always available, along with marlin, mahi-mahi and tuna, although only a handful of stalls are open.
At one of them, Cornelius Carrington, of the Freedom Fish House. fillets a trevally with the speed and dexterity of a man who has spent many years with a fish knife in his hand.
“Beryl was like a surprise attack, like an ambush,” Cornelius says, in a deep baritone voice, of the chatter of the market, the reggae and the thrashing of cleavers on the cutting boards.
Cornelius lost one of his two boats during Hurricane Beryl. “This is the first time a hurricane comes from the south like this, normally storms hit us from the north,” he said.
Although his second boat has kept him afloat financially, Cornelius believes climate change is increasingly present in the plight of fishermen.
“Right now, everything has changed. The tides are changing, the weather is changing, the sea temperature, the whole pattern has changed.”
The effects are also being felt in the tourism industry, he says, with hotels and restaurants struggling to find enough fish to meet demand each month.
Dr Shelly Ann Cox is well aware of the effects of climate change
For Shelly Ann Cox, public education is essential and, she says, the message is getting through.
“Perhaps because we are an island and we are very connected to water, people in Barbados can talk well about the impact of climate change and what it means for our country,” she says .
“I think if you talk to the kids as well, they are very knowledgeable about the subject.”
To see for myself, I visited a secondary school – Harrison College – as a member of a local NGO, the Caribbean Youth Environmental Network (CYEN), and spoke to members of the local environmental club. school of climate change.
CYEN representative Sheldon Marshall is an energy expert who asked the students about greenhouse gases and actions they could take at home to help reduce carbon emissions on the island.
“How can you, as young people in Barbados, help make a difference in the fight against climate change? » he asked them.
Harrison College students worry about the future
After an engaging and lively debate, I asked the students what they thought about Barbados being on the front lines of global climate change, even though it has only a small carbon footprint.
“Personally, I’m very pessimistic,” said Isabella Fredricks, 17.
“We are a very small country. No matter how hard we try to change, if the big countries – the major pollution producers like America, India and China – don’t bring change, all that we will do will be useless.
Her classmate, Tenusha Ramsham, is slightly more optimistic.
“I think all the great progress in history has been made when people collaborated and innovated,” she says. “I don’t think we should be completely discouraged, because research, innovation, technology creation and education will ultimately lead to the future we want.”
“I think if we could communicate to the world’s superpowers the pain we feel seeing this happening to our environment,” adds Adrielle Baird, 16, “then it would help them understand and help us work together to find ways to solve the problem. the problems we see.
For the island’s young people, their future is at stake. Rising sea levels now pose an existential threat to the small islands of the Caribbean.
It’s a point on which Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley has become a global advocate for change – calling for greater action on looming climate catastrophe in her speech to COP29 and calling for compensation economically from the industrialized nations of the world.
Steven Bourne had to postpone his retirement
On its coasts and in its seas, Barbados feels like it is under siege, facing problems ranging from coral bleaching to coastal erosion. While the impetus for action comes from the island’s youth, it is the older generations who have witnessed the changes that have occurred.
Steven Bourne has fished the waters around Barbados all his life and lost two boats in Hurricane Beryl. As we look out over the coastline from the bar of a dilapidated beach shack, he says the island’s sand has shifted before his eyes.
“It’s an attack of the elements. You see it washing away the beaches, but years ago you sat here and you could see the water’s edge coming over the sand. Now you can’t because the sand has accumulated so much.”
Coincidentally, in the same bar where I spoke with Steven was the Home Secretary, Wilfred Abrahams, responsible for national disaster management.
I pointed out to him that this must be a difficult time for disaster management in the Caribbean.
“The whole landscape has completely changed,” he replied. “Once upon a time, it was rare to have a category five hurricane every year. Today we have them every year. So the intensity and frequency are concerning.”
Even the length of the hurricane season has changed, he says.
“Before, we had a nursery rhyme that said: June, too early; July, eve; October, everywhere,” he told me. Extreme weather events like Beryl’s have made such an idea obsolete.
“What we can expect has changed, what we have prepared for our whole lives and what our culture is built on has changed,” he adds.
Fisherman Steven Bourne had hoped to retire before Beryl. Now, he says, he and the rest of the islanders have no choice but to continue.
“Being afraid or anything like that doesn’t make any sense. Because we have nowhere to go. We love this rock. And we will always be on this rock.”
