A warning by senior Caribbean international diplomat Sir Ronald Sanders, pushes the region, its leaders, institutions and people to come to terms with the reality that they alone are primarily responsible for their continued and viable existence on planet Earth.
“The time for pleading with the industrial world has passed, collective action must define the region’s response to the climate change crisis,” states Sir Ronald in an opinion column carried in yesterday’s Business Guardian.
Developing countries facing the climate crisis must recognise that notwithstanding many grandiose promises made by the industrial world at international conferences to support in quantity, quality and timing anti-climate change measures in the developing world, those promises have not been forthcoming after the delegates walk out of the conferences.
The reality of the Caribbean island-nations, even continental Guyana with low shorelines, is the exposure which exists to inundation by rising floodwaters, hurricanes, droughts and extremely high temperatures amongst other climate-engendered disasters. Many are biodiversity hotspots and experience a disproportionate impact of natural hazards associated with climate change, warns the UN.
Further, and to complicate the dangers posed by geography, “small nations such as those in the region have narrow resource bases, are heavily dependent on external trade in which they are disadvantaged by the nature and rules of trade, exogenous economic shocks, economic volatility, and limited access to development finance,” states the Sixth Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of the United Nations.
Sir Ronald’s encouragement is based on his attendance at international conferences and the experience of duplicity between what was committed to by the industrial world and their reneging on those agreements post-conference.
At its core, the challenge laid out before the Caribbean and other small island states by the senior regional diplomat is one for the grouping and the individual countries to take on the responsibility which came with political independence. Yes, the reality is that no small island state, even continental nations, can exist in isolation from the rest of the world. Inevitably though, there are special civilisational problems which cannot be left to the doing of other countries.
Accession to independence requires that the burdens of development and in the instance of climate change, must be shouldered by the citizens of individual countries.
Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley has emerged as spokesperson at international arenas for Caricom; and has indeed been doing a good job of saying frankly to the powerful nations what has to be said. However, even if embarrassed for a moment, they soon regain equilibrium and reengage in damaging practices and ignore commitments made to assist those countries affected by their harmful environmental practices.
In T&T, the annual flooding disasters must be countered through programmes of information to reduce and even eliminate clogging of waterways, greater efforts at collection, purification and storage of water and the utilisation of natural sources of energy. Our gross delinquency, which is responsible for the setting and encouraging of forest fires that burn away flora, with the ensuing exposure of valuable topsoil to disintegration and consequent lower levels of agricultural productivity, also needs to be prevented. These climate disasters can all be prevented by a conscious effort at acknowledging that we are on our own without meaningful assistance from the rich, developed industrial world.
