The No.5 Cemetery in Spanish Town, St Catherine, which has already been reported as being full. (Gleaner file photo)
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Leonard Francis, NEPA's Director of the Spatial Planning Division and Eromonsele Akhidenor, Research Officer at NEPA
The National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) has said there could be an increase in the cost of burials in Jamaica due to limited land space for cemeteries.
Of the estimated 427 recognised cemeteries across Jamaica, 68 per cent are running out of space.
Leonard Francis, NEPA's Director of the Spatial Planning Division, said Jamaica has only a quarter of the minimum designated land space for burials.
Speaking Tuesday morning on TVJ's Smile Jamaica, Mr. Francis said there have been proposals to expand the capacity but this would still not be adequate.
"A lot of Jamaica's lands are conservation areas, a lot of them are wetland areas that are conservation as well, we have massive agricultural areas, residential areas. So the cemeteries are just one of the competing uses and we have limited land space," he said, noting that this could lead to a case where people pay more for burials because of the scarcity of the land space.
He urged Jamaicans to consider alternative methods of disposing of the remains of their loved ones.
Data from NEPA indicate that 92.3 per cent of bodies in Jamaica are buried with the remaining 7.7 per cent cremated.
Eromonsele Akhidenor, Research Officer at NEPA, said new laws will be needed to facilitate other alternative methods of disposing of the dead.
He said currently, Jamaica's laws permit cremation and well as burials at different cemeteries, however, there are other options, such as a multi-tier or vertical burial system in which there is a single structure with different compartments (going upwards like an apartment building) where persons can be buried.
Mr. Akhidenor was also a guest Tuesday on TVJ's Smile Jamaica.
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