CUBA-US:
Science Bridges the Gulf
Orlando Matos

HAVANA,  (IPS) - Oil prospecting in Cuban waters in the Gulf of Mexico may become another factor in the conflict with the United States, but researchers from both countries are carrying out joint studies on this body of water in order to preserve one of the planet's richest ecosystems.

The U.S. Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies (HRI) is carrying out a research project on the northwestern coast of Cuba. HRI is collaborating with the University of Havana's Centre for Marine Research (CIM) in the project, which began in 2003, and so far they have carried out three joint coastal expeditions, with four more planned for this year.

"The Harte Institute is fortunate to be one of the few institutions licensed (by the U.S. government) to carry out marine research in Cuba," the director of the HRI programme on the island, David Guggenheim, said in an interview with IPS.

This permission is in stark contrast with, for example, Washington's ban on U.S. oil companies participating in oil prospecting on the Cuban underwater platform in the Gulf of Mexico, only 137 kilometres from the Florida peninsula.

The 112,000 square kilometres of undersea oilfields put out to tender by Cuba in 1999 have estimated potential reserves of one to 9.3 billion barrels of crude and between 1.9 and 22 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

Guggenheim explained that apart from CIM, other Cuban government institutions such as the National Enterprise for the Protection of Flora and Fauna (ENPFF) and the National Centre for Protected Areas (CNAP) are participating in the joint research programme.

"They are keen to participate in the project because the results will be useful for planning protected areas in this region in the future, and that is another of the goals of our work: to help protect marine resources," the U.S. researcher said.

According to information from CIM, two out of the many research projects that it sponsors, on ecology, are being carried out in direct collaboration with HRI.

Their titles are "Marine Ecosystems in the NW Region of Cuba: Present Condition, Main Threats and Recommendations for Conservation and Rational Use", and "Shark Ecology and Conservation" in the same geographical region.

The specific aim of the first project is to chart the distribution of the main habitats of biological diversity, identify the threats arising from human activities and formulate recommendations for the conservation and rational use of the ecosystems.

The second project focuses basically on expanding knowledge about sharks, and enabling Cuba to join international efforts for better management of this marine species.

"So far we have been successful not only in founding this project, but also in making it grow by incorporating new study components, such as sea turtles, sharks and dolphins, and working with another U.S. institute, the Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, Florida," Guggenheim said.

Guggenheim, who holds a PhD in Environmental Science and Public Policy, stressed the importance of the shark research project, because numbers of some shark species in the Gulf of Mexico have fallen by as much as 98 percent.

Cuba's geographical position "makes this area very important biologically, in order to be able to understand where sharks migrate to, which regions they live in, where their mating grounds are, and the same for sea turtles and dolphins. Then we can develop plans to protect them," he said.

He was also appreciative of research into marine biodiversity on the island. As an example, he explained that "one of the world's most serious problems at the moment is the degradation and death of coral reefs."

"In the Florida Keys there has been a more than 40 percent reduction in coral reefs, and in Veracruz (Mexico), home to one of the most beautiful coral reef systems, around 95 percent of the coral has died," Guggenheim said.

He noted that Cuba "is still a mystery to scientists," because its coral reefs have been conserved. "In fact, they are the most beautiful I've ever seen, so we should put this piece of the puzzle alongside the other research results, to find out how to protect these ecosystems."

But it is very important for Cuba to carry out more of this research, he said, because he had seen some patterns on the island similar to those elsewhere in the Caribbean, which warned of possible threats.

Among these patterns, he described "coral whitening, areas with algae filaments that harm the coral, and in the case of sharks, over a week without seeing any, so although this region is healthy compared to others, it's important to remain alert."

That is the reason why the research being carried out with Cuban scientists, covering some 300 kilometres of the country's coastline, is of such interest for the whole region, and is being carried out "in great detail," he added.

"This particular area between Havana and Guanacahabibes has never been comprehensively studied before. Now it will be mapped systematically by computer, using geological information," Guggenheim said.

The Guanacahabibes peninsula, 267 kilometres from Havana, was declared a Biosphere Reserve in 1987 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).

The discovery of 27 new species of molluscs on the ocean floor off this peninsula, announced in December by the Cuban Institute of Oceanography, confirmed the area's reputation for high biodiversity.

The political differences between the Cuban and U.S. governments pose financial and logistical difficulties for the project, which has already cost over 100,000 dollars, raised by HRI from private donations.

One of the obstacles mentioned by Guggenheim was getting permission "to use submarines to research Cuba's deep sea bottom," impossible at the moment because of the conflict between Washington and Havana. "It may become possible in the next few years," he said.

In spite of the frustrations, Guggenheim emphasised the positive side. "I'm very happy that lots of foundations in the United States recognise that our work for conservation goes beyond political considerations," he said.

HRI was founded in September 2000 in Corpus Christi, Texas, with private funding. Since then it has been studying the Gulf of Mexico, upon which Texas has a coastline, on the basis of a partnership between researchers in the United States, Mexico and Cuba, which share custody of the Gulf and its rich resources.

Backed by an Advisory Council made up of personalities from all three countries, the guiding principles of its research in the Gulf of Mexico are economic and environmental sustainability, both of which are of paramount importance to the countries involved.

The Gulf of Mexico has a surface area of over 1.8 million square kilometres, and it provides billions of dollars a year in oil and gas for Mexico and the United States, and in fishing for all three countries.

According to Guggenheim, "the Gulf of Mexico is a clear example that we need inter-government collaboration, because protecting it is too great a task for any single country."

Research carried out by HRI has demonstrated that the Gulf of Mexico is suffering from serious pollution from various sources, which is damaging its ecosystems, so that combined conservation efforts are required.

In June there will be a meeting to analyse the problems of the Gulf, to be held in Tampico, Mexico. "I hope that Cubans will be able to participate, and that it will be the start of cooperation between the three countries so that we will really be able to come to terms with some of these problems," Guggenheim said.

In regard to the opportunity opened up by the collaboration between HRI and CIM, he said that in addition to the research, "about 20 Cuban students depend on the project with a view to earning their master's or doctoral degrees."

"So this is more than just a research project; it is planting seeds for the future of science and of international cooperation, in the hope that these ties between the United States and Cuba will continue to grow," he concluded.