Islands First

Caribbean islands are largely dependent on tourism, with the exception of Cuba and Haiti. In the Caribbean, tourism accounts for 15% or more of the gross domestic product in the Caribbean, and over 2.4 million jobs. Sea levels in the Caribbean region are expected to rise 30 to 50 centimeters (11.8 to 19.7 inches) in the next 50 years, significantly higher than average world levels. According to a report issued by the Dominican government, if sea-level will rises by 6 meters under business-as-usual by 2050, the tourism industry would be eliminated and send the country and region into complete economic chaos. In 1990, almost two decades ago, Jamaican authorities had estimated that it would take US$462 million to protect coastal tourism on the island. On the Caribbean island of Grenada, beach erosion from tropical storms and weakened coral reefs has destroyed popular tourist attractions such the nesting spots for leatherback turtles. Much of the 200 miles of Belize's coral reef has been "bleached" in the last decade and is likely to die as a victim of global warming. The island of St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands has recently experienced the island's worst-known bout of coral bleaching due to record-high water temperatures. Tourist agencies have historically led tours through the coral reefs. This is now changing as more and more big dive operators on islands are downplaying the coral, replacing the colorful corals with shipwreck or eel spotting tours.

In addition to tourism, climate change also affects the agricultural and fishing sector of Caribbean economies. In a region where fisheries, agricultural industry (as well as tourism) takes place along the coasts, climate change disrupts the already vulnerable export based economies of vulnerable island states. The region now produces premier crops of bananas, sugar cane and rice, all of which will be affected by water logging and salinity as the seas invade the water tables. Based on research carried out by the Caribbean Planning for Adaptation to Global Climate Change Program, the massive fish kills of 1999 in Guyana, Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago, were due to changes in the salinity and ocean acidification of the Caribbean sea brought on by above average rainfall attributed to climate change.

Looking beyond economic impacts, the health and well being of Caribbean populations will also be affected by erratic and unpredictable weather. Approximately 60 percent of people in the Caribbean occupy coastal plains, and will be affected by health problems associated with solid waste disposal and contamination of ground water. For example, over 50% of the population of the Dominican Republic lives near coasts where a 6-m sea-level rise would plunge them into the sea. The Caribbean is already familiar with the destructive impact of hurricanes on buildings and infrastructure. Infrastructure damage rises sharply because of the combined effects of more powerful storms from warmer ocean waters and the power of rising wind speeds on built structures. Severe weather events such as Hurricane Mitch that swept across the Caribbean and Central America in early December 1998 threaten the security of a country. An estimated 19,000 people died as a result of Hurricane Mitch in addition to the displacement of three million people. The Caribbean islands will continue to be exposed to hurricanes and the associated storm surges and wave actions, earthquakes and the tsunamis they generate, volcanic eruptions, land and rock slides, flooding and drought.

As weather cycles in the region become less predictable, extreme drought becomes a possibility. The nature of the drought is unpredictable, so that regions that get a lot of summer precipitation may get more, and the regions that get very little precipitation will get less. According to atmospheric scientists that reported in the April 18th issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, recent computer models show a decrease in tropical rainfall to occur by 2054. The decrease in summer rainfall is estimated at 20 percent or more by the end of the century. Despite these future forecasts, drought is already a problem in some of the Caribbean islands, such as the U.S. Virgin Islands where the dry spell is frequent and severe. Even minor depletions in rainfall have affected agriculture and required water rationing. Caribbean islands like St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands already experience drought that global warming is likely to exacerbate. Countries that have already experienced the drying trend include: Cuba, Jamaica and Haiti, Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, Belize, Guatemala and Honduras.

Overall, problems stemming from climate change will exacerbate already existing issues such as poverty, population pressures and trade pressures that face vulnerable island states. Some Caribbean communities and economies are at risk because of inappropriate planning, poorly managed resource exploitation and the lack of strategic energy policies that are commonly found in low-income countries. In order to deal with the impact on coastal communities, risk assessments must be performed in order to provide the necessary baseline data. In coping with the impacts of climate change, low-income countries that are also small island countries are left without any comparative advantage.