Minister of Water, Environment and Climate Change, Hon. Matthew Samuda, says that water prohibition orders could be implemented in August, amid decreased rainfall.

The restrictions are to preserve water supply ahead of the September reopening of schools, which are among the country’s largest consumers of potable water.

“We are first encouraging conservation but being very clear that as at August 10, if the Met Service’s evaluation of rainfall in July is as we suspect – that we had continued declines in rainfall and if the forecast for the rolling three-month forecast has not changed or has worsened, prohibition orders will come into effect,” he pointed out.

The Minister was addressing Thursday’s (July 30) press conference on measures to address the current dry conditions at the Ministry’s Kingston 5 offices.

He noted that prohibition orders speak specifically to irrigation and watering of gardens, lawns, grounds and farms, filling of pools for domestic services, washing of cars, watering and washing of roadways and any purpose that would require unusual or non-essential use of water.

Mr. Samuda said that water levels and storage systems are not currently at critical levels, but the normal end of August rainfall is not expected to happen.

“As a country that would have gone through significant learning loss associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, the disruptions of Hurricane Beryl, Tropical Storm Rafael and Hurricane Melissa, we simply cannot afford for water to contribute to learning loss in September. So, we will take the measures that we absolutely need to, to ensure that we’re able to safeguard the opening of schools in September,” he said.