Barbados’ Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Fisheries Santia Bradshaw has formally confirmed that technical and fisheries teams are currently conducting a full assessment to map out the required scope of work and projected funding for restoring the aging haul-out facilities at Tent Bay, a move that comes after local fishing representatives raised urgent alarms over accelerating shoreline erosion and repeated structural failures of existing infrastructure last month.
The official review was triggered after Moonesh Dharampaul, president of the Black Fin Fleet Co-operative Society, publicly highlighted the growing risks fishers face from disappearing shoreline and the lack of functional, safe facilities to pull vessels out of the water. Bradshaw noted that the Fisheries Division has partnered with engineering experts from the Scotland District road infrastructure project to evaluate the site and outline a clear path forward, building on her past experience leading the public works portfolio when the Scotland District upgrade was first launched.
“The chief fisheries officer and our entire fisheries team are on the ground working through every detail of the Tent Bay situation,” Bradshaw explained in a recent statement. “Given my previous role at the Ministry of Public Works, I know that the Scotland District project team, which oversaw the regional road upgrade, has deep local knowledge of this coastline, so our officials are now in active discussions with both the ministry and the project leadership to address the concerns that fishers have brought forward.”
Bradshaw emphasized that the Tent Bay site has a decades-long history of failed engineering attempts to support local fishing and marine traffic. She revealed that multiple haul-out structures have been constructed at the location over the years, but past projects likely skipped critical preliminary geotechnical and coastal assessments, resulting in repeated structural collapse that has left the facility unusable for many fishers today.
Complicating the restoration effort, the original Scotland District road upgrade initiative never included allocations or planning for marine infrastructure improvements at Tent Bay, meaning a full independent assessment is required before any public funding can be allocated to the project. “The Scotland District project was always focused on road improvements, not haul-out facility upgrades, so our fisheries team has to start from scratch to figure out exactly what this site needs, and how much public investment will be required to properly restore it,” Bradshaw said.
The minister also cautioned that any immediate work at Tent Bay must be balanced against the island’s broader national budget constraints and existing commitments to large-scale coastal infrastructure projects across Barbados. The government currently has active maritime infrastructure upgrades underway at multiple sites, including Conset Bay, where a contract for a new boat yard facility has already been awarded, alongside planned upgrades to the local community centre and the main landing site and associated buildings.
Bradshaw made clear that the Mia Mottley administration cannot address every long-standing gap in the country’s maritime infrastructure in a single budget cycle, and appealed to Tent Bay’s fishing community for patience as the government works through competing priorities. “We simply can’t deliver upgrades to every facility across the island all at once,” she stated. “We’ve asked stakeholders to understand that we face both operational capacity limits and significant financial constraints that require us to phase projects. Even the planned upgrades to the Oistins facility required securing international funding to move forward, which demonstrates the scale of the investment we’re working with.”
While Bradshaw reaffirmed that Tent Bay’s restoration remains on the government’s long-term list of priorities, she noted that immediate national focus has shifted to post-disaster recovery work following Hurricane Beryl, and to expanding safe shelter facilities for fishing vessels along vulnerable coastlines to prevent repeated destruction during future severe weather events.
“Tent Bay is absolutely on our radar, but right now we have prioritized sites that suffered severe damage from Hurricane Beryl, as well as coastal locations on the eastern side of the island that can provide safe harbour for large numbers of fishing vessels,” she explained. “If another storm like Beryl hits, we need to give boat owners the ability to pull their vessels up onto safe shore along the eastern coast, so we don’t see a repeat of the widespread vessel destruction we saw last year.”