The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune

Not that Richard Lightbourn, nor the topic of conch depletion in The Bahamas, needs any endorsement at all, but I would simply like to add my own voice to the discussion.

A Google search of “Bahamas Conch Depletion Tribune” provides 15,600 results and untold pages of articles and reports.

On March 20, 2013, Larry Smith in Tough Call heralded a warning of the conch population collapsing, and before that, in April 2005, the Nassau Institute raised the entire issue of fisheries in The Bahamas becoming extinct. Yet today in 2019, nothing much has happened and I am not sure that the word “much” is relevant, as the likelihood is that nothing has happened at all.

Someone in government, and in fact everyone in government and the opposition, need to get behind this issue, and at a minimum, begin what may be a trial and error process of steps to see exactly what is needed to end the downhill run that we are currently on. Yes, first step is to end exports of conch. Every tourist that eats a conch salad, or scorched or cracked conch, is already an export of it.

Government of course are always concerned about the next election, but as Mr. Lightbourn says, the end result, if we do nothing, is that no one currently working in that industry, will have a job. And none of us will ever eat conch again.

BRUCE RAINE

Nassau

February 7, 2019