Guyana on Thursday joined a regional pact to protect jaguars, the elusive spotted cat that is the biggest land predator in the Americas but is vulnerable due to expanded agriculture and mining that carves away at their fragmented habitat.
Monthly Archives: January 2013
Protected areas system gets boost
The Guyana protected areas system received a significant boost yesterday with the exchange of notes to formally initiate a funding grant from the German Government to the Guyana Government via the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment.
Natural Resources and Environment Minister, Robert Persaud and German Ambassador, Stefan Schluter with the signed financing agreement. Also in picture are: Deputy Commissioner, Denise Fraser, Commissioner Damian Fernandes and German Consul Ben ter Welle. (Adrian Narine photo) Future investments will focus on the construction and equipping of offices for the recently established Protected Areas Commission (PAC).
German Ambassador Stefan Schluter said that his country’s partnering with Guyana on environmental issues began in 1996, and since then, has continued to grow. “We are actually now celebrating the third phase of this on-going project which, so far, amounts to US$14 -15M. This is the latest phase which will have about Euros 5 million in aid.
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The new reality TV series “Bamazon,” on the History Channel, along with already established shows like “Gold Rush” and “Jungle Gold,” have elevated the global mining bonanza into living-room entertainment. Each focuses on a different group of Americans seeking their fortune in distant, ostensibly dangerous locales: “Bamazon” in Guyana, “Gold Rush” in Alaska and Guyana, and “Jungle Gold” in Ghana. But while these shows claim to depict “reality,” they gloss over the most awful truths of gold mining, particularly as it is practiced in the tropics.
Guyana Conservation Network | GuyCoN 