An unprecedented amount of sargassum has invaded this summer part of the paradisiacal white sand beaches and crystal clear water of the Dominican Republic, in the process of recovering tourism, the country’s main source of foreign exchange.
For weeks, the algae that originated in the Sargasso Sea, a region of the Atlantic in the eastern United States, it has spread along country shores, including places where it is not common.
With rakes in hand, dozens of men work under the harsh Caribbean sun on Cortecito Beach in Punta Cana, picking sargassum, which “has arrived suddenly and in quantities never seen before.” , told Efe one of the workers, of Haitian nationality, who preferred not to identify himself.
A colleague and compatriot of his, who also does not give his name, nods his head and adds: “today there is nothing compared to what was on the weekend.” while pushing a cart to the maximum of sargazo, a task to which he is devoting eight hours a day and for which he receives 600 pesos ($ 10.7) from the hotel for which he is working on these tasks. cleaning up.
And is that the increase has been excessive compared to previous years, according to those familiar with the matter, although there is no official report on the number of beaches affected in the country.
UNCERTAIN IMPACT ON TOURISM
The phenomenon, which affects Caribbean beaches especially in summer, occurs at a time when tourism is re-emerging in the Dominican Republic after the pandemic.
The country received 2.4 million tourists between January and July, a figure higher than all visitors in 2020, when world tourism came to a halt due to the coronavirus.
The sargazo “started to come in a very rational, smooth way, it was manageable, but lately we’ve had a major barrage of sargassum, which has really hurt us,” the president of the Hotel Association of the This (Asoleste), Ernesto fast, although clarified that there has been no cancellation of reservations for it.
Of opposite opinion, Marcelo Vargas, 1 tour operator in the area and head of the Sargazo Monitoring Group in Bávaro / Punta Cana, said that the situation is already beginning to have consequences, about to cause changes in plans of many tourists.
“In this area it is difficult to take excursions. The client arrives and says: look at the dirty water, I do not want to make this excursion and cancel it” or, at best, decide to change the destination, said Vargas, during a tour of Bibijagua Beach in Bavaria.
In fact, he said, concern over the issue has led to a considerable rise in members of the group he leads, which now exceeds 6,200, most of whom have joined in recent months to exchange views on the issue or ask for information on the current state of the beaches.
Another tour organizer, who preferred not to identify himself, was even more pessimistic about the immediate future of internal travel in this area, while criticizing the “lack of support” from the authorities to resolve this issue. .
A SOLUTION FROM THE PUBLIC AND THE PRIVATE
Several hotels in the area already have temporary burglary barriers, but according to a hotelier in Efe, some of them broke a few weeks ago with the passage of storm Grace, throwing large amounts of algae on the beach.
Hoteliers are waiting for the installation of a fixed barrier, in a project funded equally between the state and the private sector, which will go out to tender in the coming weeks.
This barrier is the result of an agreement signed last November by the Ministry of Tourism and the National Association of Hotels and Restaurants (Asonahores), which led to the creation of a fund of 11.8 million dollars to mitigate and manage the sargassum in the next five years.
These resources will be used exclusively for the payment of the service of supply and installation of 31,524 linear meters of barriers or similar solutions on the beaches of the areas of Punta Cana, Bávaro, Cap de Toro, Sorra Blanca and Uvero Alto, all to the east, the main tourist destination of country.