Report recommends incentives
An environmental report has recommended that creative incentives be introduced to encourage greater private sector involvement in the island’s watershed management and conservation activities.
The report was presented Wednesday at a workshop looking at the development of incentives for private sector investment in local watershed management.
Among the short-term incentives mentioned were:
. Amendments to the Income Tax Act to allow certain types of expenses incurred by private landowners to be deducted for the determination of taxable income. Such expenses must have been incurred for watershed management and conservation purposes such as low impact agricultural techniques.
. Tax exemptions or rebate for properties devoted to watershed management and conservation.
. Introduction of user fees to support watershed management and conservation. These fees should be imposed for the extraction of the watershed’s economic resources.
The report was conducted on behalf of the Ridge to Reef Water Project by environmental lawyer, Winston McCalla and economist, Wilberne Persaud.
The project, a joint programme of the Jamaican Government, through the National Environmental Planning Agency (NEPA) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), focuses on improving the quality of key natural resources in areas that are both environmentally and economically significant.
“To improve watershed management we need public education, legislation and critical financing… so we have to look at innovative ways of financing,” said Howard Batson, director in the office of environment at the USAID, while addressing the workshop on Tuesday.
“We need the economic incentives to persuade the private sector to do greater conservation,” Batson said. He said proper watershed management would result in quality water supply for the island.
The report also made suggestions for long term incentives. Among them were:
. The allocation of national or municipal taxes to specific areas of great importance to watershed management.
. Allowing land owners to enter into a legal agreement to manage his or her property according to specific conservation terms, in exchange for financial compensation.
. Allowing landowners to exchange property that is significant for watershed management and conservation reasons with a different property that may be of equal economic value.
“We are not looking at one set of incentives, the challenge is to come up with an equitable system to reinvest in the watershed area,” said executive Director of NEPA, Franklin McDonald.
According to McDonald, recommendations would be submitted to the National Watershed Management Council for further discussion.
“We have to do some more consultations and harmonize before we can take it to Cabinet,” he said.
Meanwhile, Minister of Development Paul Robertson said that the Government was working on cutting down the length of the incentive process.
“To apply for incentives one has to go through 30 different steps – we are working on simplifying that,” he told the workshop.
According to the minister, the Government recognised the need to provide incentives for the private sector to invest in sectors of the economy that they may not have viewed as economically viable.