From left to right, Professors Carlisle Pemberton, Gregory Gouveia, and Edwin Ekwue of UWI, and UGA associate dean of the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Ivery Clifton.

Office of International Public Service and Outreach
Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics

This project, funded by the U.S. State Department, links the University of Georgia (UGA) with the University of the West Indies (UWI) in a program of collaborative research on the topic of sustainable development. Faculty from several disciplines at UGA and UWI are cooperating on a program of applied research that addresses an extremely important environmental issue in the Caribbean—the conflicting resource management claims on the Nariva Swamp in Trinidad. By working closely with environmental specialists, governmental officials and policymakers, NGO representatives, and local farmers, the project utilizes an interdisciplinary approach that will contribute to a successful and creative solution to a very important set of specific environmental issues. Trinidad and Tobago will sometime in the next few years set forth the structure of land and water rights and environmental controls that will govern how humans interact with the Nariva ecosystem. This project has the potential to provide a much sounder scientific basis for these decisions while taking into account the social implications of the policies.