I saw in the Bonaire Reporter (of Jan. 22-Feb. 5, 2010) that the dive magazine 'Scuba Diving' has awarded several '2010 reader’s choice awards' to Bonaire. Bonaire placed first in a number of categories, including Top Overall Diving.

The Bonaire Reporter-editors commented 'The award certificate says it all! Congratulations Bonaire!'. And I think they are right...it does say it all. However, I do not think congratulations are in order. What these awards say is: if Bonaire reefs are considered top marine life, macro life and the best overall diving (etc.) that the Caribbean and Atlantic has to offer, then we are in deep trouble.

Everybody who has been diving, snorkeling and/or fishing regularly knows that the number of fish has declined drastically in the last two decades, and the same goes for the percentage live coral coverage on our reefs. Long term scientific monitoring and research on Bonaire has confirmed this.

Hurricanes like Lenny and Omar played a very visual role in the serious deterioration of our reefs' health. But other factors like unregulated (coastal) development, pollution (e.g. waste water), erosion, over-fishing, too many tourists (divers, snorkelers, swimmers) in our coastal waters have been just as important, if not more important. These are non-natural factors that have a negative impact on our reefs *every single day*.

Top Overall Diving Awards allow for 'keeping up appearances', whereas what we should be doing is making sure that winning that 'beauty-contest' means more than just being the least ugly of them all.

For that we need some serious changes. Bonaire should really start to live up in every aspect of its society to the eco-image they try to promote. Then Bonaire will win awards we can actually be proud of.

---

quote:

And I think they are right...it does say it all.

---

Well, Boneiru, don't think your challenge for Bonaire to live up to its ecological reputation will be met any time soon, given the referendum at the end of March to determine whether or not Bonaire "goes it alone" and detaches from Holland or favors integration. Without Holland's money and support, there will be no sewage plant, no modernizing of the infrastructure, and the reefs will die.

Whether or not Scuba Diving will notice is questionable since many of these magazines will not give an honest assessment of the reefs since they don't want to lose their advertisers. If divers and snorkelers really want to know the true state of Bonaire's declining reefs, they should pay attention to diveboards and chat spaces where more and more divers are saying Bonaire is no longer worth the thousands of dollars it takes to fly and stay here.

The Scuba Diving "awards" are just reader ratings....if the divers like it, they vote for it. The high rankings reflect primarily two things: lots of divers in Bonaire, so lots of votes, and reef degradation that has been slower than in many other places. So it is an unnormalized, relative ranking.

The advertising in the magazines doesn't seem to affect those reader-rankings, at least not directly. I suppose more advertising (for Bonaire) might mean more divers, which might mean more votes, but ALL the places get advertised so, relatively, I think it is a minor effect.

What would be important would be the 5-10-20 year perspective on health of the reefs in various places. I think the data are available to some extent, but we aren't likely to see the report in the magazines, except maybe Dive Training.

Boneiru, I have deleted the dupe thread

Carry on

[unregulated (coastal) development]

Boneiru..Do you really mean to say this? I've gone through the construction process on waterfront property. Rest assured it's FAR from unregulated. Try building on an ocean front lot and then tell me it's unregulated..

@Vince DePietro-www.bonairebeachcondo.com

I was mostly referring to lack of spatial planning having resulted in, amongst others, disturbance/ destroying of natural rainwater effluent systems (e.g. the so called "roois" and salinas) because of building activities along the coast, and this, in turn resulting in erosion and an increase in nutrients in the coastal waters.

However, the building activities itself also have negative effects on the marine environment, as, usually, putting up screens to prevent sand from blowing into the sea is not part of the regulation, or is it? Also, when sand is being transported to the building site, it usually is in an uncovered, open trucks.

@Pauline Kayes - the sewage plant is mostly funded by EU-money, I believe. The temporary sewage treatment project is indeed more dependent on funding from the Netherlands.

(Message edited by boneiru on February 3, 2010)

[ usually, putting up screens to prevent sand from blowing into the sea is not part of the regulation, or is it?]

Boneiru: I can say that the FIRST thing that was done at the Bellevue site was the construction of a wall to prevent any debris from going into the ocean.

Now come to think of it, I did not notice the same on all the Piet Boon houses recently constructed on Punt Vierkant which are also oceanfront. So perhaps it is not a stated building regulation. Honestly I can't emphatically state one way or the other on this issue. If not, I think we agree there should be such a regulation.

I never argue....coz I know I'm right all the time. One word of correction though....the idea that "EU Money" isn't Dutch. EU is European Union and I doubt that Bonaire would have access to European Union infrastructure funding as an island in the Caribbean. I don't think there's a "CU"

just my thoughts

joe