Santo Domingo.- Jake Kheel, president of the Environmental Protection Business Association (ECORED), emphasized the need for continuous monitoring and long-term planning to address the growing sargassum problem. Speaking at the “Challenges and Solutions for Sargassum” panel during Sustainable Expo 2025, he warned that inconsistent efforts could lead to worsening beach degradation and a lack of coordination among key stakeholders.

Kheel stressed that tackling sargassum requires a well-funded strategy and collaboration between public and private institutions. He noted that the tourism sector has been directly affected, with many industry professionals feeling “traumatized” by the recurring issue. Without a structured, year-round approach, he cautioned, the problem will persist and continue to harm coastal environments and economies.

Sustainable Expo 2025 serves as a vital platform for promoting green technologies and fostering cooperation between government and private enterprises. Kheel’s remarks reinforced the urgency of integrating environmental protection into broader economic and tourism strategies.

Environmentalist Kammie Holder has launched a scathing attack on the importer of a popular Jamaican energy drink, accusing the company of flouting environmental laws and neglecting its corporate social responsibility as discarded bottles increasingly litter the island.  

Holder, the chair of the Future Centre Trust, accused beverage distributors of prioritising profits over environmental responsibility, amid complaints that bottle returns were not being accepted.  

Speaking about the distributor of the drink in question, he disclosed: “We have reached out after getting concerns from the hikers in this country and the public at large to that importer, who has treated us with scant respect as it related to their corporate social responsibility.

“Within 48 hours, I shall be writing to the Ministry of Commerce, under which the Returnable Containers Act falls, and I shall be writing to that company to ask them where is their corporate social responsibility as it relates to that drink that they import from Jamaica,” Holder said on Wednesday.  

The Returnable Containers Act of 1986 establishes a mandatory deposit-and-refund system for empty beverage containers. In 2019, it was amended to expand the list of containers that should be accepted for return to include separate sealed glass, metal, aluminium, steel or plastic bottle, can, jar, carton or other receptacles which may consist of other materials that are recyclable or reusable and is capable of holding 3.8 litres or less. This amendment gives reusable items other than polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles and glass bottles value, as they can be redeemed for between five cents to 15 cents each.

Some of the representatives from the 11 charities seen here with the donations they received.

Holder further lambasted the distributor’s boastful claims of financial success despite failing to address the pollution caused by their product. He stated: “It’s totally unacceptable that you can brag about your millions that you are making yearly [but] you have no concern for the environment. My voice may be strong, but I have zero tolerance for ignorance when it comes to our environment.

“If I was the minister, those drinks would be banned from Barbados. If you are going to be so bold to speak of the millions you are making but continue to import a drink from Jamaica, and then your bottles are littering this country—my beautiful country—and then the importers are not taking the bottles back, to then brag about the millions you are making yearly? Unacceptable.”  

Holder also criticised the lax enforcement of littering laws, stating that despite the strengthening of environmental protection laws over the years, authorities have been slow to engage in strong enforcement measures.  

He said: “Over the last 15 years, I’ve participated in Clean Up Barbados, and persons have been caught littering and you know what happens? They get a slap on the wrist, which to me is an epic insult to those persons who every year go and participate in Clean Up Barbados. We are talking about thousands of persons every year cleaning up behind dirty persons, but yet when a person is caught, they are told to go and get it cleaned up.  

“Totally unacceptable, so until you have the police service, a ministry, an inspectorate taking it seriously, nothing will change in this country,” Holder declared.  

Paul Bynoe, managing director of B’s Recycling, echoed Holder’s concerns and revealed that attempts to engage with the drink’s distributor had been unsuccessful.  

Bynoe said: “I don’t understand his story with the agent. We try to get all the agents to make contact in order for them to receive them back or let us know what to do and it’s just not happening. I don’t know what to say to them or what to do in order for them to understand that they are breaking the law, and the lawmakers now got to step in and say ‘okay, this is right or this is wrong—as far as I see it.” 

Efforts by Barbados TODAY to reach the distributor for comment also proved unsuccessful.

(SB/SZB)

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ACB Grenada Bank donated $3,000 to the Autistic Foundation of Grenada in commemoration of World Autistic Awareness Day on 2 April

View the full post ACB Grenada Bank donates to Autistic Foundation of Grenada on NOW Grenada.

“By wearing blue and taking part in World Autism Awareness Day, we send a powerful message of acceptance and inclusion”

View the full post Wear blue on World Autism Awareness Day 2 April on NOW Grenada.

Santo Domingo.- In the Dominican Republic, the conversation around autism should extend beyond April 2nd, as legislators and activists call for urgent reforms in education, healthcare, and therapy services for individuals with autism. Representative Patricia Núñez stressed the need for more resources and urged reforms to the Disability Law and Social Security Law to ensure specialized therapy coverage. Yalis Soto, an educator, pointed out that the public education system lacks trained teachers and adequate materials for children with autism, leaving them with limited opportunities.

Additionally, Representative Anny Mambrú highlighted the importance of early diagnosis, noting that autism is often detected too late, delaying access to essential services. She emphasized the need for national investments in diagnostics, specialist training, and improved services, aligning with global statistics that show autism affects one in every 100 children. Overall, the article underscores the state’s responsibility to provide adequate support for individuals with autism throughout the year, not just on Autism Awareness Day.

Santo Domingo.- Health Minister Víctor Atallah has signed nine agreements allocating 50.6 million pesos to Non-Profit Associations (ASFLs) to strengthen national health programs. These funds will support primary healthcare initiatives, including access to drinking water, physical rehabilitation, psychological care, and assistance for patients with HIV, tuberculosis, and organ transplants.

The agreements were signed with organizations such as the Homs Foundation for Human Solidarity, Archdiocesan Caritas, and the Association for Family Assistance. Minister Atallah emphasized that these partnerships are essential for advancing social development, ensuring rights, and fostering equity. Amalfi Brito, president of the Association for Family Assistance, urged all benefiting institutions to maintain transparency and efficiency in managing public resources.

This initiative aligns with Law No. 1-12 of the 2030 National Development Strategy, which seeks to replace traditional subsidies with structured resource transfers through management agreements, optimizing the allocation and impact of public funds.

Santo Domingo.- The Senate of the Republic has approved on first reading a bill aimed at promoting health tourism across the country. Proposed by Senator Daniel Rivera, the initiative seeks to establish and develop medical centers that cater to foreign visitors in need of specialized healthcare. Article 11 of the bill designates health and wellness tourism as a national priority to position the country as a leading destination for medical services.

A resolution was also passed urging President Luis Abinader to implement a “Special Plan for Titling State Land in the Border Zone,” proposed by Senator Franklin Martín Romero Morillo, to prevent unauthorized foreign occupation of Dominican properties. Furthermore, Senator María Mercedes Ortiz Diloné’s initiative to recognize Dr. Richard Oliver Bidó Medina for his contributions to health sciences was approved.

Scientists have developed a device that can translate thoughts about speech into spoken words in real time.

Although it’s still experimental, they hope the brain-computer interface could someday help give voice to those unable to speak.

A new study described testing the device on a 47-year-old woman with quadriplegia who couldn’t speak for 18 years after a stroke. Doctors implanted it in her brain during surgery as part of a clinical trial.

It “converts her intent to speak into fluent sentences,” said Gopala Anumanchipalli, a co-author of the study published Monday in the journal Nature Neuroscience.

Other brain-computer interfaces, or BCIs, for speech typically have a slight delay between thoughts of sentences and computerized verbalization. Such delays can disrupt the natural flow of conversation, potentially leading to miscommunication and frustration, researchers said.

This is “a pretty big advance in our field,” said Jonathan Brumberg of the Speech and Applied Neuroscience Lab at the University of Kansas, who was not part of the study.

A team in California recorded the woman’s brain activity using electrodes while she spoke sentences silently in her brain. The scientists used a synthesizer they built using her voice before her injury to create a speech sound that she would have spoken. They trained an AI model that translates neural activity into units of sound.

It works similarly to existing systems used to transcribe meetings or phone calls in real time, said Anumanchipalli, of the University of California, Berkeley.

The implant itself sits on the speech center of the brain so that it’s listening in, and those signals are translated to pieces of speech that make up sentences. It’s a “streaming approach,” Anumanchipalli said, with each 80-millisecond chunk of speech – about half a syllable – sent into a recorder.

“It’s not waiting for a sentence to finish,” Anumanchipalli said. “It’s processing it on the fly.”

Decoding speech that quickly has the potential to keep up with the fast pace of natural speech, said Brumberg. The use of voice samples, he added, “would be a significant advance in the naturalness of speech.”

Though the work was partially funded by the National Institutes of Health, Anumanchipalli said it wasn’t affected by recent NIH research cuts. More research is needed before the technology is ready for wide use, but with “sustained investments,” it could be available to patients within a decade, he said.

SOURCE: AP

The post A stroke survivor speaks again with the help of an experimental brain-computer implant appeared first on Barbados Today.

Santo Domingo.- Former Health Minister Bautista Rojas Gómez has accused Agriculture Minister Limber Cruz of irresponsibility in handling the swine flu outbreak affecting Dominican farmers. He argues that the government’s failure to take timely action poses a serious threat to national pork production.

Speaking on the morning program Uno Más Uno, Rojas Gómez warned that delays in addressing the outbreak endanger small producers, putting their livelihoods and the country’s food security at risk. As a member of the Fuerza del Pueblo (FP) party, he has repeatedly criticized what he sees as mismanagement of the crisis.

He urged President Luis Abinader to seek better advisors on the matter, arguing that the president is being misled about the severity of the situation. He also emphasized that disease control is the State’s responsibility, not that of farmers, who should only focus on biosecurity measures on their farms.