Community Co-Management Agreement Signed for Orocovis Recreational Area

Orocovis, Boriken (UCTP Taíno News) - The Department of Natural Resources and Environment signed a co-management agreement for the Doña Juana Recreational Area in Toro Negro State Forest with the Ala de la Piedra Community in Orocovis, Puerto Rico. Naniki Reyes Ocasio, Board president for Bo. Ala de la Piedra signed the agreement on behalf of the community. The project is described as an environmental educational project and eco-tourism community self-determined initiative that will among other activities reopen a natural water fed pool in the Doña Juana Recreational Area in the Toro Negro State Forest in Orocovis. Reyes Ocasio is also the founder of the Caney, Conclave Taíno Guatukan de la Cordillera, a member organization, and Representative of the United Confederation of Taíno People.

UCTPTN 08.29.2008

Indigenous Dominica community gets CYPCC computers

Photo: Members of the Young Achievers Group of Atkinson Community pose with their computers and accessories.

“The days when students used the library to do research and complete their assignments are virtually gone with the advent of the internet and other ICTs.”

DOMINICA - The Commonwealth Youth Programme Caribbean Centre (CYPCC) and the Youth Department of the Government of Dominica have collaborated to present computers and other Information Communication Technology (ICT) to the Young Achievers Group of Atkinson Community.

At a presentation ceremony on June 28 at the Carib Territory, CYPCC Director Mr Charles challenged the Young Achievers to look towards the development of a Youth Information Centre that would help assist artists and other skilled young people to further develop their talent.

"Computers and ICT have become a very important aspect of the development of the community. There are communities among our Commonwealth countries where ICT has made a significant difference between people living in poverty and an improved standard of living," Mr. Charles said.

"This is the first phase; set up the computers and then you can get ready for the second phase but give us a development plan towards that quest and I can assure you that we will assist in making available additional ICT equipment to establish the Youth Information Centre," he urged.

Chief Youth Development Officer at the Division of Youth, Mr. Jules Pascal noted that the days when students used the library to do research and complete their assignments are virtually gone with the advent of the internet and other ICTs.

However, a proper computer facility was lacking in the Carib Territory and especially in Atkinson, he noted.

Pascal said the Youth Division will ensure that the computers are networked and assured that the Division will also service the equipment free of cost.

Chairman of the Atkinson Village Council, Mr Kitchener Laville said he was elated that the community's youth will finally have access to the internet which will ease the difficulties encountered doing school assignments.

Laville noted that the computers will be placed at the community centre and students should be able to begin using them shortly.

Source: Commonwealth Youth Programme

Carifesta X symposium highlights Amerindian artifacts

The Indigenous Art of Hammock weaving demonstrated

at CARIFESTA X in Guyana

GUYANA - A symposium on Indigenous Performance Traditions on Monday focused on the collection of Amerindian artifacts in the Austrian Museum of Ethnology which houses some 350 artifacts from Guyana. Most of these artifacts were collected from the Makushi and Wapishiana regions early in the 19th century by Austrian zoologist Johann Natterer. The symposium was held at the Guyana International Conference Centre, Liliendaal as part of a symposia panel for Carifesta X, the Government Information Agency (GINA) reported.

Minister within the Ministry of Education Dr. Desrey Fox opened the session and panelists Claudia Augustat, Head of the South American Collection, Museum of Ethnology in Vienna, Austria and Henk Tjon, Theatre and Artistic Director with the Surinamese Delegation to Guyana made presentations.

According to GINA, Minister Fox stated that indigenous performance tradition is probably the most misunderstood since it is not what people are accustomed to as it focuses on birds and animals with specific characteristics which the Amerindians find impressive.

This, she said, impacts on the very lives of Amerindians and helps them to survive in very harsh environments.

“We are in a country with a diversity of cultures and I don’t think we are able to utilize each other’s resources,” Minister Fox is quoted as saying. She noted also that this will “lead to understanding each other and to have a sense of deep identity which we are still grappling with.”

Meanwhile, Augusta said that according to records in the archives of the Austrian Museum, Natterer made his journey in 1831 by travelling up the Rio Branco River to the Brazilian border, then on the Takutu, Ireng and Pirara Rivers before reaching British Guiana.

The collection pieces featured body ornaments, weapons, basketry and musical instruments created and used by the indigenous peoples.

These include objects made from feathers, beads, seeds and animal teeth, GINA added.

Source: Stabroek News

Researching Impact Of Global Warming On Corals

ScienceDaily (Aug. 26, 2008) — For just one late-summer night each year, the shallow waters off the coast of Puerto Rico fill with the pale-pink spawn of elkhorn corals -- the tiny, round packets of the adult corals' eggs and sperm.

This year, Iliana Baums, assistant professor of biology at Penn State, is there to collect the coral spawn as part of a research and education project to grow the newborn juvenile corals for distribution to aquaria and to the wild. "It looks like it's snowing," she said, "except that the egg and sperm packets rise underwater to the surface rather than fall to the ground."

Baums's reason for collecting the spawn is twofold: she hopes to acquire important information about how corals will respond to global warming, and she also is teaching a group of 28 aquarium professionals, as part of an international workshop, how they can participate in the protection of corals. Baums will hunt for and collect coral spawn on the nights of 21 and 22 August. For seven days thereafter, she will remain at the site, working to grow the newborn juvenile corals for distribution to aquaria and to the wild.

According to Baums, corals are extremely sensitive to changes in water temperature. "An increase in water temperature of just a couple degrees Celsius results in visible damage to adult corals and their offspring," she said. Referring to a paper published in a July 2008 issue of the journal Science in which the authors report that one-third of all reef-building corals face an elevated risk of extinction from climate change and other factors, Baums said it is imperative that scientists and marine-resource managers begin to think about how to rescue these important animals.

That's why Baums is searching for particular populations of coral that produce offspring that are better able to withstand high water temperatures. Because most coral species are triggered by moonlight to release their egg-sperm packets, Baums will begin her experiment with a nighttime trip to a designated reef off the coast of Puerto Rico. There, she will collect spawn from elkhorn corals, which are protected as a threatened species by the United States Endangered Species Act. In small rearing chambers, she will place eggs from certain populations with sperm from certain other populations.

Over the next seven days, she will raise the newly formed juvenile corals in saltwater tanks on land. She then will ship half of them to several aquaria around the world and will return the other half to the reef. "Corals are most vulnerable when they are very small, and our protected nursery will help them to get through the first critical days," said Baums.

Next, the juvenile corals in captivity will be subjected to a variety of higher-than-normal and lower-than-normal water temperatures in order to pinpoint those offspring whose parents can tolerate abnormal water conditions. Once Baums identifies these individuals, she will search their genomes for variants of genes that are responsible for resistance to abnormal water temperatures. With this knowledge, she then can develop genetic markers that will enable her to identify wild elkhorn-coral populations throughout the Caribbean that contain such gene variants.

Water from the ocean is pumped into tubs where juvenile corals will be raised for a period of seven days after scientists harvest them from the wild.

In collaboration with SECORE (SExual COral REproduction), an international organization of professional aquarists and scientists that is concerned about coral conservation, Baums will hold a workshop during the annual coral-spawning event in Puerto Rico. Through the workshop, she and other researchers will teach a group of 28 aquarium professionals from around the world how to collect coral spawn, do fertilization experiments, raise larvae, and care for larvae once they are shipped back to the participants' home institutions. The workshop, which is now in its third year, already has been given to over 60 aquarium professionals. Baums and other members of SECORE plan to continue to the workshop in future years to reach as many aquarium professionals as possible.

"Poachers often collect wild corals to satisfy the demand for aquariums, but aquarium professionals are looking for alternative, less destructive sources of these animals. SECORE's goal is to develop methods to eventually breed corals in captivity, thereby reducing some of the pressure to collect corals from the wild," she said. "We are starting by raising juveniles from wild-caught eggs and sperm, which enables us to provide aquariums with the corals they desire without damaging wild adult colonies.

In return, the aquarium operators help us to perform the experiments and give us tips on how to raise adult corals in captivity, which is something they are very good at." Baums added that the establishment of good aquarium populations is a safeguard against the extinction of elkhorn corals.

The corals that Baums ships to aquaria will undergo one of two treatments: half of them will be exposed to species of the zooxanthellae -- algae that live inside the cells of corals and provide them with necessary nutrients and energy -- that naturally occur with elkhorn corals, and half of them will be exposed to zooxanthellae from other regions of the world, where elkhorn corals are not present.

In past years, elkhorn corals in captivity readily took up foreign zooxanthellae and coped better than those that took up only native species of zooxanthellae. These observations will be tested in a controlled experiment as part of this year's workshop. While Baums said she would not release foreign strains of zooxanthellae into the wild, she does think such measures could be beneficial to corals that are maintained in aquaria.

Baums is partnering with Margaret Miller, a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), who will do the same experiment using corals from Florida, where annual minimum water temperatures are lower. The team will compare corals in the two locations to learn if there are any differences in their abilities to withstand high and low water temperatures. A goal of the research is to find out if current temperature differences between Florida and Puerto Rico will influence the abilities of corals to tolerate future warm-water conditions associated with global warming.

This research and the workshop are funded by the NOAA and the National Science Foundation.

Photo: Scientists capture coral spawn using a special net. (Credit: Ramon Villaverde, Columbus Zoo)

After 10 Years Columbus Gets A New Home in Boriken

Borikén (UCTP Taíno News) – Ten years ago the United Confederation of Taíno People and its member organizations in Borikén (Puerto Rico) – Consejo General de Tainos Borincanos and the Caney Quinto Mundo – launched a protest campaign against the Mayor of Cataño and his plan to erect a giant monument to Columbus in the town. Defiant in the face of a barrage of letters and phone calls demanding an end to the project, the Mayor vowed to find to see the project to completion. The project failed after the town could not raise the funds to erect the statue. A decade later it seems the project may finally see completion and give the 310 ft. Columbus a new home on the island.

After years of sitting in pieces in a Cataño park the 2.4 million dollar statue is said to be moving to Mayaguez where it will be installed at a port run by management company, the Holland Group. According to the Mayor of Cataño, the company plans to install the bronze and steel statue in time for the city’s hosting of the Central American and Caribbean Games in July 2010.

Local Taíno community members were dismayed by the announcement.

Roger Guayakan Hernandez, a representative of the United Confederation of Taíno People (UCTP) in Borikén notes “this is just another example of the misinformation that continues to be promoted concerning Columbus and his presence in the Caribbean. Columbus is no hero. This is an insult to indigenous peoples everywhere”.

Hernandez reports that calls to the company to discuss local community objections to the proposal have not been returned. The UCTP plans to work with local groups and individuals in a follow-up to the 1998 campaign to call for an end to the project.

UCTPTN 08.20.2008