by Rick Lowe
Mr. Andrew Allen had a considerable letter to the editor of The Tribune in Saturday's edition (March 14, 2009).
While I'm not sure I support the ban on turtle harvesting either, to equate the desire to ban turtle farming as an attack on Bahamian culture by those involved must necessarily be an attempt at being provocative.
That aside, let's examine his point about the turtle farming in Grand Cayman, BVI.
He specifically states that Cayman did not respond to the disappearing green turtle "by simply banning and delegitimising established local culinary traditions". But that is in fact what they did.
Boatswain's Beach's web site, now a government run agency, specifically notes that in the 1900's the population of turtles was disappearing and "national and international regulations and alternative sources of income reduced the turtling industry to a negligible level".
The Cayman Turtle Farm was actually established in 1968 by a group of American and British investors. It was the brainchild of the late Sir Anthony Fisher, founder of the Atlas Economic Research Foundation.
Unfortunately this company went bankrupt in 1975 and was bought out by a German group, but it too went bust in 1983.
The Cayman Islands Government now owns it, albeit they operate it as a private company. Their goal "is to produce enough turtles to supply the needs of the local market and continue releasing turtles".
Apparently the turtle farm was devastated by a hurricane in 2001 but it was rebuilt across the street where it remains operational.
As an aside, being a government run entity, losses do not matter as any debt accumulated is simply left for future generations to worry about.
Visit Boatswain's Beach web site here…
Back to Mr. Allen's article.
He closes by noting that we in The Bahamas should not be "intimidated by self-righteous, but ultimately arrogant and ignorant people who would encourage us to throw our own culture away rather than investing in making it sustainable."
Strong words indeed. But if he means individuals in The Bahamas should invest in a turtle farm to help the diminishing turtle population, I would agree with him.
Too bad he would alienate those people that might wish to invest in such a project with the same demeanour he accuses them of.
Interesting –
Has the public heard from Turtle fishermen?
My view (perhaps uninformed) is that we do not really have a turtle fishing industry and that there is little demand for turtle meat.
If there are legitimate fishermen making a living out of it they should be outraged by the “fishermen” who catch turtles with no intention of selling them for meat – rather they treat them terribly in public at the roadside in order to command a ransom for their release.
If they wanted to sell the meat they would simply butcher them and sell the meat as they do with other fish.
There is a big difference – these guys are low-life – I stopped to talk to one and he was extremely aggressive, just a nasty nasty individual.
When I go fishing, I pour rum or such in the gills or kill my catch with a knife – I do not let it suffer.
It is these people who are threatening the turtle fisherman’s livelihood.