Wild Tobago

  The cocoa industry over 100 years ago was focused on export of beans, mainly to Europe. Today, new entrepreneurs have restarted the Trinidad and Tobago cocoa industry at home with chocolate making. Pat Ganase reports on some 21 st century cocoa challenges.   Gillian Goddard’s home-based enterprise started with drying bananas and processing cocoa nibs ten years ago. She learned to make chocolate – from online demonstrations – and has extended her influence to empower individuals and communities. Today, Goddard and the Alliance of Rural Communities are dealing with a shortage of cocoa beans to keep their enterprises going, to ensure the health of communities and deal with the bigger issues of climate change.   “We called the meeting of cocoa and chocolate producers and associated institutions because our #1 issue is solidarity. We have a common shared experience. In the face of institutional silence, we need a community response,” said Goddard, fou...

  Human activity and the changing climate are affecting life and life cycles in the oceans. Dr Anjani Ganase discusses some of the observations made this year.   Marine plastics on deep coral reefs Scientists from the California Academy of Sciences in collaboration with scientists around the world have conducted over 1,200 surveys on coral reefs from 83 countries to quantify plastic pollution on coral reefs. This study included deeper sections of coral reefs (the mesophotic zone) that can extend to depths of 150 m in some locations and accessible only to a handful of technical divers and remotely operated vehicles. Surveyed sites varied from reefs adjacent to cities and populated areas to remote and uninhabited islands. As expected, areas closer to human populations had greater amounts of plastics. However, plastics were found even on some of the most remote sites. The coral reef with lowest density of plastic occurred around the Marshall Islands in ...

Times of crisis are times of great opportunity, so the Chinese believe. What opportunities will the crisis of a shortage of cacao beans from Trinidad estates bring to a cadre of 21 st century   chocolate makers? Pat Ganase surveys the Trinidad and Tobago industry.     “It is heart-breaking,” says Isabel Brash, “that cocoa production has been declining drastically over the last couple years. It is difficult to plan chocolate production and take orders for even a month in advance. The biggest season is fast approaching; for Christmas we start chocolate production in September.”   Over the past decade, the architect turned chocolate entrepreneur has built her business at the Cocobel chocolate house on Fitt Street using beans bought mainly from the Rancho Quemado estate. She has also worked with beans from other estates – La Deseada in Santa Cruz, San Antonio and independent farmer Anand Narine – and enjoys telling the stories of the flav...

Among the most vulnerable to climate change are tropical coral reefs and the ecosystems that nurture many juvenile fish. Coral reef ecologist, Dr Anjani Ganase, raises the alarm for severe heat stress over the next months.   Coral Reef Watch (NOAA) for the Caribbean is predicting severe coral bleaching throughout our region from July to October. A bulletin was released in June by the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology using NOAA’s Coral Reef Watch four-month outlook (https://coralreefwatch.noaa.gov/index.php).   What is coral bleaching? Tropical corals have formed a special relationship with microscopic algae that live in the tissues of corals and give them the vibrant colours we associate with coral reefs. The microalgae photosynthesise using the sunlight and produce enough energy to supply themselves and their coral host. In return, the coral protects the algae from predation and supplies them with essential nutrients and the remov...