Dead animals, old appliances and household rubbish — the reality confronting residents of Bayleys Plantation Road, St Philip.
Farmer Alvin Wilson appealed to those responsible for the illegal dumping to stop, warning that it is disrupting the health and wellbeing of those living in the area.
When Barbados TODAY visited the community on Friday, Wilson pointed to several locations along the highway where rubbish and discarded appliances had been thrown recklessly. But the most disturbing sight was a large flour bag along the roadway leading to his home, farm and those of his neighbours — filled with dead chickens.
Wilson said: “A lot of illegal dumping, with chickens, dead chickens, sometimes it’s pigs, sometimes it’s sheep but mostly it’s animals that they’re dumping in the area. Sometimes it’s old fridges, stoves, this has been going on now for years.”
He described the stench from the decomposing animals as overwhelming. “Right now I have a headache because that scent below there hit me direct.”
Wilson said the latest batch of dead animals was dumped earlier this week.
“I can say maybe Tuesday this was dumped here, this was in Tuesday afternoon, this was not even in the night, this was high daytime, that batch was dumped there — dead chickens,” he said, pointing behind him to where a large swarm of flies hovered over the bag.
The farmer explained that although the animals are often discarded just feet away from homes and farms, residents have no choice but to pass the area daily, as it is the only access road. “You have to pass there to get home and also to get to farmlands, because the area is surrounded by farmlands.”
He said the perpetrators have targeted a stretch of road from Mapps to Golden Grove. “This long stretch is dark at night and allows truckers, even homeowners, to discard their appliances at night, because the road is a dark, lonely road.”
Wilson is particularly concerned that the perpetrators have now grown bold enough to dump waste in broad daylight.
“Something needs to be done with these culprits.”
Neighbour Wilbert Gollop said the problem has persisted throughout the 16 years he has lived in the area:
“I went to the Kingdom Hall on a Sunday, and when I came back home, there was a big ram sheep, not far from where I am standing, right in the road, massive ram sheep, dead though, and swollen and stinking. This has been a major problem coming up in this road because this is how we get home. You can’t get home without being involved with the stench.”
He also recalled discovering the bag of dead chickens after returning home one day.
“They’ve actually brought live chickens already, let them go in the same road, I’ve never seen nothing like that. Many of them and because of not being able to be fed, they died all along the road.”
“You find pigs, dogs, mainly chickens, and they come to dump indiscriminately when they feel like doing so. Don’t do to me what you wouldn’t like me to do to you. It’s ridiculous.”
Gollop said residents are often left to deal with the aftermath.
“It’s so close to the house, all the flies and things going to come into the house,” he said, referring to the dead sheep. “So I had to drag it into the pasture and get wood and tyres and burn it. That should not be my job.”
“If you are raising chickens making money, why then would it be the responsibility of somebody else when you just want to get rid of the garbage to come and dump it next to people’s property and on the road?”
Wilson said the ongoing dumping has begun to affect his livelihood, as customers are reluctant to travel through the area to reach his farm: “This year, customers ain’t coming back through here, it stinks, and with the road up there blocked, I am losing revenue right now.”
He added that he has been forced to deliver produce himself.
“That’s time on my hands I’m losing, and when you lose time like that, you don’t get compensated for it; furthermore, some of my customers say now we ain’t coming, so sometimes I am stuck with food on my hands.”
The farmer grows pumpkin, butternut squash, watermelon, okra and cucumbers, but said sales are sometimes delayed due to limited access.
Wilson said he contacted the Sanitation Service Authority and the Ministry of Health about the issue, and Barbados TODAY observed health inspectors visiting the area.
He urged those responsible to change their behaviour:
“Stop the dumping, if you have dead animals, call the relevant authorities to make them take away the waste, because at the end of the day it’s affecting people, so what you don’t want for yourself, stop putting it on others.”
