The Caribbean steps up to the issue of Nutrient Pollution

“The Wider Caribbean Region is experiencing unequivocal impacts of nutrient pollution including nitrogen-based eutrophication, harmful algal blooms, hypoxia and those resulting from a complex and not fully understood phenomenon of recurrent nuisance Sargassum blooms. These ecosystem scale responses have consequential effects on livelihoods and human health, not to mention the impairment of ecosystem services that underpin vulnerable island economies.”

 - Regional Nutrient Pollution Reduction Strategy and Action Plan for the Wider Caribbean Region, UNEP CEP 2021

Increasing human population in coastal areas means daily activities generate more and more nutrients including nitrogen and phosphorus. These nutrients are necessary for life, but when present in air and water in excessive amounts, create problems for coastal and marine ecology and habitats.  They enter the environment from wastewater treatment facilities, run off from land in urban areas during rains (stormwater), farming and the release of fossil fuels.

In normal amounts, nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorous support the growth of algae and aquatic plants, which provide food and support habitats for fish, shellfish, and other marine organisms. However, when too much nitrogen and phosphorus enter rivers and coastal waters the result is algae feeding and growth off the nutrients, creating algal blooms and consuming all the oxygen, leading to oxygen deprivation or hypoxia. Large growths of algae, called algal blooms, can severely reduce or eliminate oxygen in the water, leading to illnesses and death of fish and other aquatic species that need oxygen to survive. Algal blooms can also produce elevated toxins and bacterial growth, which directly impact human health. 

People can get sick if they come into contact with this polluted water, consume tainted fish or shellfish, or drink contaminated water. Even at low levels, nutrient pollution in ground water, which in many areas is a source of drinking water, can be harmful; infants, in particular, are vulnerable to nitrogen-based compounds called nitrates in drinking water.

The identification of hypoxic zones is also important because they can depress fish growth and reproduction, thereby affecting economically important fisheries negatively.

 

Caribbean nearshore areas and nutrient pollution

The State of the Convention Area (SOCAR) report on land-based pollution, which was commissioned by the Contracting Parties to the Land-Based Sources of Marine Pollution (LBS) Protocol of the Cartagena Convention, the only legally binding environmental agreement in the Region, was published in 2019. It showed that several sites in coastal waters throughout the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico Large Marine Ecosystems had poor status with respect to selected water quality indicators, including nitrogen and phosphorus.

The SOCAR classifies the waters in the WCR as good, fair, or poor based on threshold ranges of dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) and dissolved inorganic phosphorus (DIP) found in samples taken from both insular (island) and continental sites in the wet season when runoff from land is greatest.

Nearshore coastal waters adjacent to mouths of major river basins throughout the Wider Caribbean area have been particularly affected, resulting in serious environmental and human health issues, and impacting economies. Approximately 164 hypoxic zones have been reported within the WCR and the frequency of harmful algal blooms (HABS) has increased rapidly since the 1980s. 

 

A Nutrient Pollution Reduction Strategy and Action Plan for the region

In October 2019, the UNEP Caribbean Environment Programme (CEP) Regional Coordination Unit (CAR RCU), Secretariat to the Cartagena Convention, the region’s only legally binding instrument for the reduction of marine pollution, initiated the development of a Regional Nutrient Pollution Reduction Strategy and Action Plan (RNPRSAP) due to the increased need to reduce nutrient pollution.  The RNPRSAP aims to provide a framework for increasing collaboration and action to reduce the impacts of excess nutrient pollution on priority coastal and marine ecosystems in the region.

It responds to and supports the Cartagena Convention and its Protocols, the Caribbean Large Marine Ecosystems (CLME)+ Strategic Action Programme, the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, and numerous other multi-lateral agreements to which Caribbean countries have committed.

The 5th Conference of Parties of the Cartagena Convention’s Protocol Concerning Pollution from Land-Based Sources and Activities (LBS COP) will meet on 26th July 2021 to consider, among other things, the formal adoption of the RNPRSAP, which has nine pillars:

• Pillars 1- 5 deal with nutrient sources: nutrient management in agriculture, including livestock farming; nutrient from non-point sources; domestic wastewater and industrial discharges; and marine sources. 
• Pillars 6 – 7 focus on ecological impacts: coastal water quality; and coastal and marine habitats. 
• Pillars 8 and 9 focus on socio-economic consequences of human health and wellbeing, and the blue economy; and cross-cutting enabling conditions.

According to Chris Corbin, Programme Manager at the Cartagena Convention Secretariat with responsibility for the LBS Protocol, “This new Strategy provides a road map of short-, medium- and long-term actions, targets and indicators to support countries in the region to reduce pollution from excess nutrients in an integrated matter.”  Where nutrient management in domestic wastewater is concerned, it recommends the expanded use of nature-based solutions in combination with hard engineering, the recovery of nitrogen and phosphorus, and reuse of treated sanitation waste as some of the best management practices.

Representatives of member countries at the 5th LBS COP will also consider strengthening of the LBS Protocol annexes on Domestic Wastewater (Annex III) and Agricultural non-point sources (Annex IV) by introducing new quantitative discharge standards for nitrogen, and possibly also for phosphorus.

Next steps for rolling out of the RNPRSAP include:

• Preparation of a plan by the Secretariat for incrementally rolling out the strategy, in collaboration with Contracting Parties, LBS Regional Activity Centres, and sub-regional bodies;
• Establishment of a regional, multi-disciplinary advisory group focusing on nutrient pollution;
• Sharing of knowledge and experiences among Parties of the Convention;
• Prioritization of needs and actions at the national, sub-regional, and regional levels;
• Identification of nutrient pollution hotspots and opportunities to develop pilot projects including supporting governments to develop national nutrient pollution strategies and action plans;
• Mainstreaming of the RNPRSAP into countries’ national planning and development frameworks;
• Estimation of the cost of implementing elements of the strategy and identification of funding opportunities, including though the private sector and development banks;
• Identification of opportunities through the Decade of Ocean Science and UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration to establish/strengthen enabling conditions;
• Development of a communication strategy and utilization of existing platforms for communication;
• Advocacy and stakeholder engagement activities to obtain buy-in and facilitate collaboration and effective implementation of the RNPRSAP.

Corbin added that while several sectors contribute to excess nutrients and pollution of the coastal and marine environment, nitrogen and phosphorous are also important for agriculture and food security.  This new strategy will focus on addressing nutrient pollution in a more integrated manner at source. Periodic monitoring and evaluation against agreed indicators and targets will ensure that it responds to national and regional development priorities while ensuring the sustainable development and use of the region’s coastal and marine resources, the main goal of the Cartagena Convention and its Protocols.    

 

About the Cartagena Convention

The “Convention for the Protection and Development of the Marine Environment in the Wider Caribbean Region” was adopted in 1983 in Cartagena, Colombia. Known as the “Cartagena Convention, it became legally binding in 1986.

The Convention is supported by 3 technical Protocols, or sub-agreements, namely the:

• Protocol Concerning Cooperation in Combating Oil Spills;
• Protocol Concerning Pollution from Land-Based Sources and Activities (LBS or Pollution Protocol)
• Protocol Concerning Specially Protected Areas and Wildlife (SPAW or Biodiversity Protocol).

The Secretariat for the Cartagena Convention and its Protocols is based in Kingston, Jamaica and is supported by specialized Regional Activity Centres (RACs). The RAC for Marine Biodiversity is hosted in Guadeloupe (SPAW RAC), the one for Oil Spills is hosted in Curacao (RAC REMPEITC Caribe) while the Institute of Marine Affairs (IMA) in Trinidad and Tobago and The Center of Engineering and Environmental Management of Coasts and Bays (CIMAB) in Cuba are the RACs for pollution.