Risks to environment will diminish gains from the oil revenues – Prof. Ivelaw Griffth

Jul 06, 2023 ExxonMobil, News, Oil & Gas

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…says Guyana faces clear, present dangers

Kaieteur News – Against the backdrop of growing concerns over the impacts of fossil fuel on the environment, Former Vice Chancellor of the University of Guyana, Professor Ivelaw Griffith says Guyana faces some clear and present dangers in the area of environmental security and he has called on the country’s leaders to craft and implement an Environmental Security Investment Plan.

Griffith shared his views in an OPED titled: Mother Nature at Work: Oil and Climate Change in Guyana.”

He said by environmental security he means circumstances where environmental-related/caused problems severely compromise the ability of state power holders to exercise normal political, economic, and military rule, which in turn, undermines the state’s internal governance or external sovereignty. According to him, understandably, citizens of Guyana have and will continue to have expectations that the country’s oil bounty will benefit them. “Yet, there is a great risk that the environmental security challenges on the horizon will diminish individual and societal gains from the oil revenues if the environmental security challenges are not addressed with what the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once called “a fierce urgency of now.”

Griffith noted that the rising sea levels might only minimally affect the offshore drilling, however, the rising waters and other manifestations of climate change will disrupt habitation and societal normalcy—and not just in Georgetown—such that the new wealth might hardly benefit the people there. “Yet, for the first time, Guyana is set to have the resources to undertake a project of this magnitude, thanks to growing oil revenues. Thus, the country’s leaders face a long-term existential imperative: to begin using some of the oil revenue to craft what might be called an Environmental Security Investment Plan. Such a plan could have two components: a short-term one, and a long-term, a transformational, one.”

Professor Griffith said maintenance of the sea defences, clearance, revetment, and maintenance of the canals and kokers, and repair/replacement and maintenance of water pumps would be key aspects of the first component. Restoration and maintenance of mangrove forests and the rehabilitation and maintenance of the coastal wall would be key aspects of the second component. Beyond this, he said the relocation of Georgetown away from the doorsteps of the Atlantic Ocean is a sine qua non for the long-term societal transformation that leaders and citizens desire and deserve. “The government is to be lauded for the current construction of Silica City, a new urban community 30 miles outside Georgetown and 33 miles from the mining town of Linden, with 3,800 acres of state land. It is envisioned as a “smart city” with residential and non-residential areas, a tourism district, and a conservationist district, and featuring sustainable urban drainage, alternative energy, and modern waste management. Indeed, one government minister promised it will be “a marvel.”

However, Griffith said the creation of this new habitation enterprise does not diminish the coastal threat; the environmental security threat to the coast persists and will worsen with the rising sea levels, especially as the oil boom is creating a dizzying pace of commercial and residential expansion in Georgetown and its environs. “Thus, while the creation of Silica City is desirable, it’s not sufficient. The relocation of the capital should still remain a serious long-term project. Georgetown’s relocation has been contemplated since the 1970s, but has been stymied by issues of political will, societal intransigence, and financing over the years.

Foreign assistance

Professor Griffith said foreign assistance certainly would be necessary to help address the extant environmental security challenges, especially the relocation of the capital. “Truth be told, the country does currently receive considerable flood mitigation and other climate change-related assistance—on both a bilateral and a multilateral basis. However, this petro-power-in-the-making cannot rely on external assistance to strengthen its environmental security; it needs to put some financial “skin in the game.”

Griffith said in the final analysis, Mother Nature’s power and presence in the nation that is five times the size of the Netherlands, an erstwhile colonizer, make true not just the declaration “water, water, everywhere,” but also the assertion “oil, oil, plenty there!” Accordingly, Guyana finds itself on both the negative and positive sides of the climate change balance sheet: it provides a carbon sink but also produces fossil fuels that add to global warming, a key ingredient of climate change. In addition to being the former Vice Chancellor of the University of Guyana, Griffith is a Senior Associate with the Center for Strategic and International Studies as well as a Fellow of the Caribbean Policy Consortium and of Global Americans.

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• Guyana, Ivelaw Griffith, Professor, revenues, Vice Chancellor

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