Gilbert NMO Morris

Principal amongst this "nebulosity" has been the batty idea of the FTAA; an idea promulgated to overwhelm and dismiss those most likely to take it seriously. (a. But no powerful nation will allow a group of inconsequential countries to participate substantively in the prosecution of its hegemony; whether political, economic or social. b. Nearly all CARICOM nations are WTO members, to what advantage?). As the Landfall Centre for Finance, Trade and International Affairs (LC-FTIA) -- of which this writer is Chief Economist -- forecasted, Brazil would and did prove the "spanner-in-the-works".

Second in this line of institutional hubris was the CSME. Vast amounts of limited resources were spent on these fronts in a spirit of phony urgency, with special pleading to a "globalization" left undefined for our regional situation; even as a preliminary means of capturing what may have been at stake for us in real terms; which would have given both definition and priority to our cumbersome initiatives.

The LC-FTIA argued that the primary focus of the nations in the Caribbean region should have been the implications of the warming of the planet and its impact on changes in global weather patterns; since across the region our "single track" economies could be brought to instant ruin. (This is true without climate change in the case of storms, but maybe true of storms because of climate change).

As with the Financial Services warnings, and the Passport issue, we react rather than prepare, and this issue has now been brought to the fore by the UN, supported now by forces larger than we are. Again we find ourselves wanting in the sense of wanting for instruction and additionally wanting in the sense that though we are -- in climatological terms -- the "canary-in-the-cave", we have neglected that which is the more important issue in want of address for ourselves.

The UN Report demonstrates that in each phase of the potential heating cycle of the planet, the Caribbean will be first amongst all world regions to face catastrophe. Whatever else happens -- be it "crawling deserts"or decreasing rainforests -- before any of that will be the melting of ice caps and the rising seas.

What are the implications?

Well, first, the cooling patterns will mean that the value proposition of our tourist industry (sun, sea and sand) will weaken severely or vanish altogether; depending upon the pace at which cooling takes place. A 2½ degree increase in the temperature of earth's atmosphere will mean seas would rise on average 3-5 metre. This means that most of downtown Nassau, the coasts of Grand Bahama and nearly all the islands in the Bahama chain, along with low-lying coastal areas across the region -- particularly beaches -- may disappear.

A major economic impact will be that coastal land collateralizing bank loans may sink below the loan-to-value ratio; particularly since there would be no beaches left. Additionally, nearly 100% of global coral reefs will die; fishing will become a futility and water shortages -- already critical in the Caribbean -- will be exacerbated by salination of our fresh water lens. The dry effect will not only alter our environmental chemistry, but will lead to fires in our regional shrub forests and in lush expanses as are found in St Lucia and Guyana; authoring exponential complications in our climatological situation.

Clearly then, this is the most significant challenge facing our region. There are those who will say: "the climate question is too much unresolved to warrant our attention", But we shouldn't tarry on such galloping nonsense. Others may opine that "warming periods" have come and gone in human history. My answer is: and humans have come and gone with them. Yet, it is our charge in our time -- with what knowledge and technologies are available to us -- to represent ourselves as having been responsible; at the very least.

Given our potential for loss in this connection, we ought to have been at the forefront of discussions on these issues region-wide. One gives no credence to the 1997 Kyoto Protocols here (The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change). Kyoto is a failure; though it provided us with a framework for the measurement of "carbon footprints" and so a means of incentivizing "green solutions" by monetizing carbon output reductions. For jurisdictions concerned to emphasize environmental awareness in the general sense, and hoping to drive a policy orientation towards the catastrophic forebodings discussed here, Kyoto is still a useful tool.

In point of fact, the very process of meeting challenges of climate change may have set both our nations and this epoch apart from our reactionary "business as usual" approaches. For instance, had we reflected upon these questions 6-7 years ago -- applying the resources wasted on FTAA and CSME -- we would, by now, have advanced on the learning curve and been capable of providing instructional emphasis. This is how one defends and strengthens sovereignty. The UN report would have been confirmation of our own insights and proactivity. This would have, in some degree, served to advance a definition and understanding of globalization in our own terms.

There are additional "early adopter" advantages that may have given further definition to the global forces and their inevitable impacts upon us: First, to occupy the foreground in the manner described herein would mean that even tourists may have gained confidence that we are capable of protecting them in the case of a climatological emergency. Second, by now our building codes would have been altered, and too therefore would we have altered our university curricula, cultivating mastery in the related subject areas; advancing our research capacities in approaches to coastal development. That is to say, beyond what the UN has reported, we may have already defined the lifestyle consistent with "weather-influenced" uncertainties and if we were truly serious, we would have entered a technological stage centered around environmental monitoring and the measurement of impacts at a microscopic level.

It is by these means that a people demonstrate their right to an assertion of their will and their comparative advantages; by a demonstration of their capacity to meet problems with "process solutions", the repeatability of which brings other nations to depend upon them.

It may be "undecidable" or 'indeterminate' - as one says in philosophy about a difficult problem - however, the impacts, even if not catastrophic, will lead to tremendous population displacement and loss of asset valuation. For these reasons alone, climate change should be a priority.

In the face of this fundamentally inevitable threat to our very economic life, what forces are we capable of meeting or marshalling?