SUNDAY 1 JULY, 2018 – UWI TODAY
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UWI NEWS
hit the most vulnerable comparatively harder
than the rich. Empirically, as a group, women
disproportionately pay the price for austerity,
she said. Austerity policies present women
with a triple jeopardy, she said: women work
in occupations that carry the bulk of the
cuts, they do the majority of care-work for
children and families, and this often comes
at the expense of their own health.
Also testifying to inequalities, Ian
Dhanoolal spoke about the experience of
the deaf community. Due to communication
barriers, many deaf adults are unemployed or
do poorly remunerated work. And although
many depend on social benefits, this does not
keep up with the cost of living. Dhanoolal said
public awareness on this issue is paramount,
yet the T&T Association for the Hearing
Impairedhas inadequate government funding,
meaning their advocacy effectiveness is
reduced. Elsewhere, the government has
stopped funding sign language translations
on newscasts for deaf persons, who like other
people, have a right to know about events
happening around them, he noted.
Trina Halfhide emphasised that relations
to the environment need to be re-thought,
especially around wastage. For instance, food
and organic material make up 30% of the
waste in landfills. This is unsustainable given
the high food import bill. For Halfhide, we
need to think about where we can make a
change and the environment is an excellent
starting point.
On issues of ecological justice, Adaeze
Greenridge took to task what she saw as the
government’s one-dimensional conception
of “development,” which for her provides
insufficient attention to the different ways
value can be ascribed to the environment,
culture, and social relations. Arguing
capitalismhas an outsized role in our notions
of growth, Greenidge laid out evidence for
how austerity policies damage ecosystems,
wildlife habitats, and human wellbeing as a
result of overemphasizing the bottom line. For
example, Buccoo Reef in Tobago is a Ramsar
Site and an Environmentally Sensitive Area.
The cost of the Sandals hotel project there
may remove mangrove, displace animals,
and deposit waste into the sea and coral
reefs, she said. She fears local workers and
business-owners who also rely on the baymay
be undercut, disadvantaged, and exploited,
yet high level political pressures continues to
push for the project even as widespread local
support is non-existent. Greenidge wrapped
up the panel discussion by asking: “What is
the price we are willing to pay for ‘progress?’ ”
Opinions expressed here are those of
individual lecturers and guests, and not
necessarily those of The UWI. Dr Scott
Timcke is a lecturer in Communication
Theory in the UWI Department of Literary,
Cultural, and Communication Studies. Levi
Gahman is a lecturer in Social, Cultural and
Political Geography at the Department of
Geography.
Progress at what cost?
Continued from
page 14
It’s not every day you get a chance to go to Russia.
But
this came true for UWI student Reynaldo Christie, whose
activism in helping to organize campus sports got him
selected as a sports ambassador to participate in this year’s
FISUVolunteer Leaders Academy in the city of Kazan, the
Sports Capital of Russia, from June 11-24. He was one of
several representatives from the Tertiary Sport Association
of T&T to represent this country at the event in Kazan,
where 96 countries were expected to be represented.
FISU stands for Fédération Internationale du Sport
Universitaire (International University Sports Federation).
It is an organization which formed in 1949, but its origin
goes back to the 1920s when Frenchman Jean Petitjean
organised the first World Student Games in Paris in
May 1923. FISU organizes both a summer and a winter
REPRESENTING TT IN RUSSIA: UWI Student Reynaldo Christie (at far right, wearing cap with T&T flag) here takes a selfie with colleagues he met in
Kazan, Russia at the 2018 FISU Volunteer Leaders Academy last month.
PHOTO: REYNALDO CHRISTIE
Reynaldo Christie draped in a TT flag during his sports volunteer training
trip in Russia last month.
PHOTO: REYNALDO CHRISTIE
Universiade, which are large international sporting and
cultural festivals held every two years in a different city.
Reynaldo Christie is delighted at the opportunity
to participate in the 2018 FISU Volunteer Leaders
Academy, which aims to develop skills and exposure
for student sports ambassadors, and to promote the
value of sports and a healthy lifestyle. It is the second
such Academy to take place, and all participants are
18-27-year-old university students with experience
in volunteering and organizing sports in their
universities.
Reynaldo Christie’s passions are diverse: he loves
animals and plants, which is why he is pursuing an
undergraduate double major degree in Agriculture
and Tropical Landscaping at UWI. He is now in
year three of that degree. From the age of 13, he was
also a huge fan of boxing and mixed martial arts,
and he won a gold medal in January 2014 as the
Youth Welterweight Boxing Champion at that sport’s
National Championship event. When he was in high
school, he evenwonKing of Calypso two years in a row
at the Trillium International School Calypso Contest.
Since coming to UWI, he has worked hard to earn
the Head of Department prize (2015/2016) for best
performance in Tropical Landscaping (Level 1). And
although he gave martial arts a rest to focus on his
studies, he found himself involved in organizing sports
events on campus in his role as Games Committee
Chairman forUWI’sGuildof Students during2017/2018.
In that role, he liaised between the Student Guild and
the University Sports Department, and coordinated
all campus games and sporting activities. It gave him
invaluable experience in a wide variety of practical
matters: from organising logistics for sports events to
marketing, budgets, sourcing sports sponsorship, and
liaising with vendors, students, and administrators.
Christie says he is especially interested in issues
of accountability in sports funding, as well as in
generating more enthusiasm for sports and general
fitness activities among university students. He’s
also keen on helping to develop better systems and
programmes for sports training.
So what is Christie’s personal motto?That’s simple:
he says: “Be the change you want to see.”
(Shereen Ann Ali)
REYNALDO GOES TO RUSSIA
