So why is Monkey River Village Drowning? Climate Change and Human Activities Combine
Tonight we share a part two on the plight of Monkey River, a small village where residents are trying to save their culturally rich community from becoming just a memory. Now reduced to only fifty-two families, the eroding landscape and encroaching sea threatens their homes. They may have to relocate entirely since the end of the village is swamp. Tonight we turn to the technical experts, who from as far back as 1998 spoke to News Five about the importance of the Monkey River watershed, and the impacts of activities along the river. And as we found out, climate change has only speed up the erosion situation over the years and the situation is becoming dire.
Duane Moody, Reporting
From as early as the 1990s, beach erosion has been wreaking havoc in the quaint Creole village of Monkey River. As we’ve been documenting the changes over the years, white sandy beaches where tourists and residents alike would gather, have been washed away. Acres of land that were once populated with homes are now under water. The village keeps getting smaller and the once vibrant community is disappearing as the waves come in closer. Repeating natural disasters over the last two decades, including hurricanes Mitch and Iris, as well as an earthquake have ravaged the community. Climate change has exacerbated the situation.
Dr. Colin Young
Dr. Colin Young, Executive Director, CCCCC
“The sea level is rising and it rises based on what we have been able to ascertain as three to four millimetres per year. And while that sounds very tiny, the rule of thumb is that the relationship between sea level rise and flooding is one to a hundred. So if there is a one inch rise in sea level, it floods a hundred inches of beach. Because the sea level is rising and the amount of sand getting to the coast is not able to replenish the sand that is being eroded by the wave action, then more and more the erosion increases and it speeds up.
Mario Muschamp
Mario Muschamp, President, Monkey River Watershed Association
“Apart from climate change and sea level rise and all of that, we still believe that one of the biggest problems that we are seeing with the erosion here comes from the activities that’s happening on the watershed.”
Upper river activities, which include sand mining, agricultural farming and deforestation, have – as News Five has documented for decades – been identified as the main cause of the erosion happening in Monkey River. Research from as early as 1998 reflected this.
Eugene Ariola
Eugene Ariola, Oceanographer, Coastal Zone Management Project [File: January 14th, 1998]
“The supply of sediment is being reduced because the water does not have the force to wash down the sediment to the beach. The force of the water is being reduced because of abstraction for irrigation to water Banana farms, Citrus farms and Mango farms, and water is being abstracted for Aqua culture and also water is being transferred from one water shed to another. This is all creating an accumulative effect on the river and therefore on the beach at Monkey River village.”
About a decade later, in 2007, Galen University was commissioned by the Protected Areas Conservation Trust to carry out an assessment of the watershed in the Monkey River. Doctor Colin Young was among the experts who undertook the comprehensive task. The findings were shocking.
Dr. Colin Young
“We estimated, if my memory serves me right, that there were over two thousand feet of land that has been lost. We calculated that millions of millions of gallons of waters were being removed out of the river, going onto the farms and then the water was being returned to a creek named Black Creek and so that water never returned back into the main channel of the river. There are all of these areas that had these huge pipes that were extracting this water. The second reason was that a large amount of the river sand used in the construction industry was being mined from the river. What mining does, it does two things: it widens the river channel because as you pull the material, the channel of the river is getting wider and wider and it is getting deeper and deeper.”
