By Dariel Pradas
MANZANILLO, Cuba, Oct 2 2024 – Every time a hurricane clouds the skies over the city of Manzanillo, in the eastern Cuban province of Granma, the sea pounds the Litoral neighbourhood, forcing many of the 200 families who live there to evacuate inland because of flooding.

When the weather is calm, the sea penetrates subtly and constantly, salinizing the water table and eroding the coast, affecting the foundations of houses and artesian wells.

“The water almost always enters this area. The houses were built too close to the sea and the mangroves are deforested,” community leader Martha Labrada, 65, told IPS.

Labrada has presided over the people’s council (local administration organisation) for 13 years, which covers the Litoral neighbourhood and a two-kilometer stretch of coastline that is home to about 5,000 people.

Also, in her jurisdiction, about 0.2 square kilometres of mangroves have been deforested or are in very poor condition.

A mangrove forest in Manzanillo Bay, eastern Cuba. Credit: Jorge Luis Baños / IPS

Protective mangroves

According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), mangroves extract up to five times more carbon than land forests, raise the ground level and thus slow down the rise in sea level.

This coastal ecosystem, typical of tropical and subtropical areas, usually consists of a swamp forest, a strip of black mangrove (Avicennia germinans) and a strip of red mangrove (Rhizophora mangle), the barrier closest to the sea, whose trunks absorb the impact of waves and protect against extreme weather conditions.

Mangroves act as nurseries for fish fry and as havens for honey bees, among a huge variety of fauna and flora.

They also serve as a protective area for fresh water. If degraded, salt from marine waters would more easily enter underground water basins, contaminating the drinkability of this liquid and disabling wells located miles inland.

Blanca Estrada, administrative coordinator of the Mi Costa project on behalf of the provincial government of Granma in eastern Cuba. Credit: Jorge Luis Baños / IPS

Protection from the sea

The Litoral neighbourhood is one of the most vulnerable in the municipality to climate change because it borders the mangroves, but it is not the only one in this situation.

In Manzanillo there are six people’s councils that are in direct contact with the coast. Some 60,000 inhabitants suffer the consequences, almost half of the total population of the municipality located 753 kilometres east of Havana.

The need to find solutions to the problem of rising sea levels was therefore born in the rural neighborhoods and villages of Manzanillo.

To counteract this prospect, small community projects emerged in 2018, also promoted by a national plan to tackle climate change known as Tarea Vida, which had been launched by the central government a year earlier.

As a result, 23 initiatives were set up in the municipality, which were later grouped in a single nationwide project called Mi Costa, the project’s coordinator in Manzanillo, Margot Hernández, told IPS.

Mi Costa seeks to create conditions of resilience to climate change through adaptation solutions based on strengthening the benefits provided by coastal ecosystems. In essence, its main task is to reforest and rehabilitate mangroves.

“In addition, we have to change living habits. That’s what we are working on,” Hernández added.

Ditch built in the middle of a mangrove swamp to contribute to its drainage and the recirculation of saline and fresh water in the municipality of Manzanillo, eastern Cuba. Credit: Courtesy of Mi Costa in Manzanillo

Behind deforestation

Manzanillo, because of its low isometry and its 25 kilometres of coastline, is in a serious state of environmental vulnerability.

The deforested areas of mangroves amount to 708.7 hectares, being the most affected concentrated at the river mouths.

With a weakened natural containment barrier, the saline waters penetrate the riverbeds and, for example, in the Yara River, in the north of the municipality, they do so up to seven kilometres inland, according to Leandro Concepción, the project coordinator for the Granma Provincial Delegation of Hydraulic Resources.

In any case, the salinity penetrates through underground water basins and, according to Hernández, the coordinator in Manzanillo, “there are people’s artesian wells, which were once used for consumption but are now salinized.”

Mangrove deforestation has several causes: the lack or blockage of channels hinders the ebb and flow of the tide and alters the exchange of freshwater with marine waters.

It is also affected by the invasion of invasive exotic species such as the arboreal Ipil Ipil or guaje (Leucaena leucocephala), anthropogenic human intervention through the construction of infrastructure, agricultural and livestock practices near the coast, and even the felling of mangroves to make charcoal.

A group of people receive a class given by the Mi Costa project at the Manzanillo Training Center. Credit: Courtesy of Mi Costa in Manzanillo

According to Labrada, the community leader in Litoral, several houses have been built almost adjacent to the mangrove, without the corresponding construction permits. Moreover, state-owned industrial infrastructures, such as a shoe factory and an inactive sawmill, cause the same damage.

Coastal and river pollution from industrial waste dumping also depresses coastal ecosystems.

For decades, the region’s sugar mills and rice industry dumped their waste into the rivers, Blanca Estrada, administrative coordinator of Mi Costa on behalf of the Granma provincial government, told IPS.

This situation is one of the examples of climate injustice in the area: upstream, the industrial sector caused environmental havoc that affected mangrove health and, at the end of the chain, the quality of life of coastal residents, making them more vulnerable to climatic events.

In 2023, decisive measures were taken to solve the problem and the few active factories no longer discharge their waste into the sea or use filters. In the second half of 2024, the results have already begun to show: “The migratory birds have returned, something you didn’t see months ago,” said Estrada.

However, the effects of climate change still persist in Manzanillo.

“The environmental situation today is quite complex for the keys,” Víctor Remón, director of Manzanillo’s Department of Territorial Development, which belongs to the local government, told IPS.

The municipality’s territory contains an extensive cay of 2.44 square kilometres, but Cayo Perla has already been submerged under the waters of the Gulf of Guacanayabo.

“It disappeared six or seven years ago. It was a beautiful key, with beautiful white sands. There was a tourist facility from where you could see the city of Manzanillo,” Remón said.

For his part, Roberto David Rosales, fisherman and Mi Costa contributor, remembers a path he used to walk along the shore until last year; now it has been ‘swallowed’ by the sea.

“Almost two meters were lost in this area in one year. These are things that force us to be protectors of the mangroves. The Mi Costa project came at the right time,” he told IPS.

Margot Hernández (left), coordinator of the Mi Costa project in Manzanillo, opens the training centre in the city of Manzanillo. Credit: Courtesy of Mi Costa in Manzanillo

Steps towards a solution

Mi Costa was made official in December 2021, but heavy work began in 2023, due to a pause caused by the COVID pandemic.

In Manzanillo, the project brought together about 100 collaborators, who were divided into small community groups of about 10 people, who support the monitoring and cleaning of mangroves and ditches and awareness-raising among the population.

Labrada also has its own people’s council group, composed of six women and four men.

In addition, training centres have been set up in the municipality on climate change adaptability, environmental safeguards, gender and other issues. To date, 10,500 people have been trained.

“We are working with the coast dwellers, because the issue is that people don’t leave the coasts, but that they stay and learn to live there, taking care of them,” said Estrada, the government coordinator.

Sunset on the boardwalk in the eastern Cuban city of Manzanillo. Credit: Jorge Luis Baños / IPS

They have also built 1,300 meters of ditches, using picks and shovels, to achieve a form of water rotation, but this figure has yet to be multiplied.

The immediate challenge is to finish building the nursery where the mangrove seedlings will sprout and then be planted in the deforested areas.

“Once we have the nursery, there will be no difficulty at all in Granma to begin the process of rehabilitating the mangroves,” Norvelis Reyes, Mi Costa’s main coordinator in the province, told IPS.

Mi Costa’s area of action in Granma covers, in addition to the coast of Manzanillo, the northern municipalities of Yara and Río Cauto.

Nationwide, 24 communities in the south of Cuba are involved in resilience actions (1,300 kilometres of coastline), of which 14 are at risk of disappearing due to coastal flooding by 2050, including Manzanillo.

The southern coast of this Caribbean island country was chosen because it is more vulnerable to climate change and sea level rise, given its lower geographical isometry than in the north.

In addition, the south also has a higher concentration of mangroves, making it more necessary and effective to build coastal resilience based on adaptation and focused on the rehabilitation and reforestation of these ecosystems.

While implemented by the communities themselves and with the participation of the villagers, the project is supervised by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment and the country office of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

The Green Climate Fund provided funding of USD 23.9 million, while Cuban state institutions contributed USD 20.3 million.

The ultimate goal will be to restore some 114 square kilometres of mangroves, 31 square kilometres of swamp forest and nine square kilometres of grassy swamps in eight years. After that, a period of 22 years will be dedicated to the operation and maintenance of the implemented actions.

It is estimated that more than 1.3 million people will benefit on this Caribbean island, the largest in the region and home to 11 million people.

UN Bureau Report

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By Humberto Márquez
CARACAS, Oct 2 2024 – Large families are already a relic of the past in Latin America and the Caribbean, as a result of modernisation and the growth of the economy and the labour force. Now, the region faces an ageing population and migratory movements.

In the region, “fertility rate has fallen from 5.8 children per woman in 1950 to 1.8 in 2024. The largest drop in fertility was between 1950 and 2024 (-68.4% versus -52.6% worldwide),” Simone Cecchini, director of the Latin American and Caribbean Demographic Centre, told IPS from Santiago de Chile.

“Improvements in education levels, living conditions, urbanisation, the empowerment of women and their incorporation into the workforce have favoured the option to reduce the number of children,” said Cecchini, whose centre is part of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC).

Martha Marcondes, an educator from the Brazilian city of São Paulo, tells IPS how the number of children has been changing in her family, reflecting regional behaviour.

“My great-grandmother had 14 children, and life was dedicated to them; my grandmother thought differently in her time and only had four; my mother had three, and pregnant for a fourth time, she chose to have an abortion,” she explains.“Improvements in education levels, living conditions, urbanisation, the empowerment of women and their incorporation into the workforce have favoured the option to reduce the number of children”: Simone Cecchini.

Marcondes only had one daughter, because “we liked the idea of a second child, but my husband and I sat down and decided not to have any more. My daughter, who is 22 and studies International Relations, is focused on her career and travelling and does not plan to have children”.

Most of her daughter’s classmates are also only children or at most have one sibling. “Having fewer children is a way of being able to provide a better life for the ones you do have,” says Marcondes.

Couples like Tamara and Héctor – they prefer not to disclose their surnames – agree. She is a pastry chef and he is a firefighter in Ciudad Guayana, in southeastern Venezuela, with a 10-year-old daughter.

“With just enough to pay for school and support ourselves, we don’t have a house or a car. Covering expenses in Venezuela is increasingly difficult, income is very low, so years ago I told Héctor: no more children,” she told IPS from her home town.

Demographer Anitza Freitez, head of the Department of Demographic Studies at the Andrés Bello Catholic University in Caracas, confirmed to IPS that “the experiences analysed in countries in crisis show that the situation of deprivation in these contexts encourages people to avoid having children.

Cecchini notes that “as people become more educated and wealthier, they choose to have fewer children. This choice has been made possible by greater access to sexual and reproductive health and the use of modern contraceptives, which have also lowered adolescent fertility”.

She notes that while the region’s adolescent fertility rate (50.5 children per 1,000 women aged 15-19 in 2024) is down from the recent past (in 2010 the rate was 73.1 children), it is nevertheless well above the global average (40.7).

A large family in Peru, which are becoming increasingly rare in Latin America and the Caribbean as modernising trends in the region continue. Credit: MSC

Ageing and the economy

The fall in fertility is causing strong changes in the population’s age structure, with a sharp decline in the share of children and a steady increase in that of older adults.

The average household size is also decreasing, from 4.3 persons in 2000 to 3.4 persons in 2022, according to ECLAC data for 20 Latin American countries, while longevity is increasing.

The average life expectancy at birth for both sexes in Latin America and the Caribbean was only 49 years in 1950 and has reached 76 years in 2024.

As a result of declining fertility and increasing life expectancy, 95 million people aged 60 and over will live in Latin America and the Caribbean in 2024, representing 14.2% of the total population. In 2030 there will be 114 million, 16.6% of the total population.

In particular, the group of people aged 80 and over is projected to grow strongly, from 12.5 million in 2024 to 16.3 million in 2030.

The declining birth rate and increasing life expectancy lead to a growth in the older population. Credit: PUC Chile

Cecchini argues that ageing populations and shrinking family sizes are reshaping economies and societies, with their burden of challenges and opportunities.

Ageing, she said, “holds challenges for public policies on social protection, health, care, as well as the labour market. Universal coverage of social protection or health care is still not provided”, and the increase in the older population sharply increases the demand on these systems.

It also increases the need for care, particularly long-term. As the traditional model of care based on women’s unpaid work within large families is no longer sustainable, “public policy measures are also needed in this area,” Cecchini stressed.

But on the opportunity side, older people are increasingly demanding products and services, which can hold benefits for markets.

The ‘silver economy’ – focused on the needs and demands of older people – brings opportunities in fields such as tourism, entertainment, telemedicine, information and communication technologies, smart home systems, healthcare, and home care, the expert says.

“New jobs in these sectors, especially in health and care, will be created as a result of population ageing,” she said.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), adopted within the United Nations 2030 Agenda, do not set targets for fertility rates, but can benefit from reductions, such as reducing poverty by having more people in the workforce with fewer dependents.

A Warao indigenous family from Venezuela arriving in the city of Boa Vista, northern Brazil. Credit: UNHCR

Demographic dividend and migration

Population ageing and declining fertility impact on the demographic dividend, the window of opportunity for economic growth and poverty reduction due to the higher growth of the population in the most productive age group, between 15 and 64, relative to the dependent population.

This segment of the population averages 68% of the total in the region, according to World Bank figures, with some countries in the English-speaking Caribbean, Brazil and Colombia above the average, and others below, such as Guatemala, Puerto Rico and Venezuela.

The foreseeable duration of this dividend varies widely across the region – the longest in Bolivia, the shortest in Uruguay – as it depends on the pace of the ageing process, determined by declining mortality, declining fertility and migratory processes.

“But we must always remember that the demographic dividend is only an opportunity, which must be taken advantage of with appropriate public policies, such as investment in the human capacities of young people and the promotion of gender equality in the labour market,” stressed Cecchini.

Migration has a major impact on countries such as Cuba, where more than 800,000 people have left in the last two years, and Venezuela, which has seen more than seven million of its nationals leave in the last decade.

“The decline in fertility in a country like Venezuela is combined with a migratory process, which translates into a loss of the demographic dividend and an ageing population,” said Freitez.

She emphasizes that this process is occurring “in a country where ageing is not at the forefront of public policy. One example is that pensions received by the elderly are not even minimally sufficient to cover some needs, and public health is very deficient”.

Old-age pensions in Venezuela are pegged to the minimum wage, which is less than four dollars a month, although some groups of pensioners occasionally receive bonuses for a few dollars more.

“The entire burden then falls on a family whose structure has been transformed, as more than one million households (of the slightly more than six million in Venezuela) have experienced the migration of some of their members, becoming transnational families,” Freitez said.

Whether due to this dispersion, reduction in fertility rates, progress of modernisation and ageing, the large families that characterised life and tradition in Latin America have now become museum pieces.

By Naureen Hossain
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 2 2024 – The escalating hostilities between Israel and Lebanon have already threatened the safety and security of more than 1 million civilians, urging Lebanon’s government and the United Nations to take swift humanitarian action and call for international support.

On Tuesday, October 1, Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati and the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Lebanon, Imran Riza, launched an emergency Flash Appeal of USD 426 million to mobilize resources that will support civilians affected by the hostilities and the developing humanitarian situation.

The appeal is intended to support the government-led emergency response through October to December 2024. It is intended to help in providing life-saving assistance for immediate needs that include food, shelter, healthcare, water, and municipal services. Funds will be allocated to humanitarian partners collaborating with the emergency response.

“This is a critical moment that demands the immediate attention and action of the international community,” said Mikati. “I urge all nations to step up their support in providing humanitarian aid and to use their influence to help bring an end to the violence.”

The appeal launched today would go forward to addressing the new and existing humanitarian needs of affected civilians. It will support the Lebanon Response Plan (LRP) 2024, which is the main framework for an integrated humanitarian plan in the country.

“Our aim is to build on and reinforce the strong cooperation and collaboration already in place, working closely with the government and our partner ministries at both national and subnational levels,” said Humanitarian Coordinator Imran Riza.

“Without sufficient resources, humanitarians risk leaving the population of an entire country without the support they urgently require,” he said.

According to the report issued on the appeal, the humanitarian response still faces multiple challenges. In addition to limited funding, humanitarian partners on the ground have also reported that securing unimpeded access to critical areas is a concern. Reaching affected groups in southern Lebanon is an issue, where congestion is limiting access to shelters. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has warned that the number of internally displaced peoples will only increase as the Israeli military issues evacuation orders, including for 30 villages in south Lebanon.

Senior leaders in the UN system, including the Secretary-General, are calling for a ceasefire or an end to the hostilities. UN Secretary-General António Guterres implored the international community to “urgently support” the appeal. In a statement, spokesman Stéphane Dujarric said that Guterres is “extremely concerned with the escalation of the conflict in Lebanon” and calls for an immediate ceasefire.

“An all-out war must be avoided in Lebanon at all costs, and the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Lebanon must be respected,” said Dujarric.

UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell also called for a ceasefire in the region. In a statement issued on Monday, she warned that humanitarian conditions were worsening by the hour as the violence intensified, adding that 300,000 children accounted for the 1 million people displaced.

“Any ground offensive or further escalation in Lebanon would make a catastrophic situation for children even worse. Such an outcome must be avoided at all costs,” she said. “We reiterate our call for all parties to protect children and civilian infrastructure, and to ensure that humanitarian actors can safely reach all those in need—in accordance with their obligations under international humanitarian law.”

UNICEF, along with its partners and fellow UN agencies, have been providing emergency supplies such as emergency hygiene kits, food, and sleeping bags. In addition to its child protection and psychosocial support services for children, UNICEF has also supported nearly 200 collective shelters in Lebanon hosting 50,000 displaced people by providing essential supplies.

IPS UN Bureau Report

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