At Shell Beach, patrols kept watch over nesting sea turtles. In Wakapau and Warapoka, residents received training to guide visitors and along Guyana’s low-lying coast, more than 40,000 black mangrove seedlings were grown and planted to help protect the shoreline.

Those were among the results presented Thursday at the Guyana Marriott Hotel in Georgetown, where partners in the Guyana Conservation Initiative reported that 374 people across 37 communities had received livelihood or technical training.

At Shell Beach in Region One, the initiative backed patrols, monitoring and tagging at a nesting site used by four species of sea turtle: leatherback, green, hawksbill and olive ridley. In the Mahaica watershed, it supported biodiversity surveys and environmental monitoring to help guide decisions about how the area is managed.

The initiative also helped establish Guyana’s first Mangrove Centre, which opened in 2023 at the National Agricultural Research and Extension Institute in Mon Repos. The G$60 million facility gives students, researchers and the public a place to learn about the forests that help protect the coastline.

The work stems from a multi-year grant the ExxonMobil Foundation awarded to the Iwokrama International Centre in 2022, with technical support from Environmental Management Consultants Inc.

During Thursday's report, Its managing director, Shyam Nokta, said the initiative showed what private funding could achieve when paired with scientific expertise and the active involvement of local communities.

Source: Environmental Management Consultants Guyana

Shyam Nokta, Managing Director Guyana Conservation Initiative.