Editorial | Looking towards Belém

As Jamaicans continue to dig their way out of the massive disaster left by Hurricane Melissa, this newspaper is also paying attention to the COP30 climate conference in Belém, Brazil.

For what happens in Belém will help to determine not just how quickly Jamaica can rebuild, but how effectively it does so, and with the resilience demanded by the exigencies of global warming and climate change.

For what happened in the western third of this island a fortnight ago, hit by among the most intense storms ever to form in the Atlantic, was not an aberration in weather patterns.

In other words, it isn’t sufficient to only talk of building better and stronger, with the inevitability of future, and frequent, catastrophic weather events in mind – as has been suggested by World Bank vice president, Susana Cordeiro Guerra. It is important to have a good sense of how this recovery, while adapting to the new climate environment, will be financed.

Which is not to imply that Jamaica has no obligation to plan for, and, as best as it can, put itself in a position to rebound from weather catastrophes. However, in addressing those responsibilities, including the existential threat posed by climate change, it is important that countries like Jamaica be clear about the major culprits for the problem, and of the burden it places on poor and developing states.

Hurricane Melissa cost at least 32 lives and damaged or destroyed tens of thousands of homes. Over 30,000 people are displaced and living rough. Preliminary assessments put the cost of the damage to private property and public infrastructure at over US$6 billion, or nearly a third of GDP. Those figures, however, are expected to rise substantially.

FAR FROM ENOUGH

At full pay-out, the government is expected to receive US$150 million from its catastrophe bonds, and perhaps the same amount from a regional parametric disaster insurance scheme. While these amounts, plus internal resources, can jump-start the initial phase of recovery, they are far from enough to fund the long-term rebuilding, with the resiliency required of the times. Indeed, it is inevitable that Jamaica will face other powerful hurricanes; or floods; or droughts; or coastal erosion associated with rising sea levels.

The government, therefore, will have to look externally for financing a recovery that meets today’s needs as well as prepare for future crises. Or, as Ms Cordeiro Guerra put it, the government must not merely engage in reconstruction “but also reimagine Jamaica”.

Which should also mean a re-imagining of the Jamaica State, whose capacities, including the ability to respond to disasters of the magnitude of Hurricane Melissa, have been badly hollowed out by decades of retreat and neglect.

The World Bank is an obvious early stop for Jamaica. In that regard, Ms Cordeiro Guerra’s early presence in the island was a welcome sign.

But it’s a relevant question, given the global demands and limits on the bank’s resources, and borrowing caps on members, whether Jamaica can look to the World Bank for the level of climate-related financing that Kingston will require in the coming years. The government will have to be strategic and resourceful.

Unfortunately, resilience planning at scale to meet the requirements of, say, the next two decades, and the cost of these projects, is one of the too many areas of policy formulation where there has been insufficient transparent debate. That analysis, if it is available, should be shared with the public. If it hasn’t yet been done, the government, in the face of this crisis, must get to it urgently. This will demand capacity from the Jamaican State.

GREAT CONTEXT

There is where Belém has great context.

First, the world has to get back on track to keeping the rise in Earth’s temperature, compared to the start of the modern industrial period, to no more than 2.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century. On the current trajectory, that rise will be over 3 degree Celsius.

But even if the world manages to pull back from the precipice of global warming and its worst consequences, developing countries will need financing to address current mitigation efforts, including the greening of infrastructure, and to enhance their resilience.

At the COP conference in Baku last year, developed countries pledged US$300 billion in climate financing by 2035, against developing countries’ request, from all sources, of US$1.3 trillion. A road map for achieving the US$1.3 trillion is to be unveiled in Belém.

However, most credible calculations put the real climate investment requirement of developing countries at US$2.5 trillion by 2030, rising to US$3.3 trillion by 2035.

There is a wide gap between real need and, up to now, the readiness, and the will, of rich countries, to provide the funding.

Yet, developing countries, Jamaica included, contributed little to the circumstances that caused global warming, and the existential threat they now face. Those who benefited most from those events, have a legal and moral obligation to those who bear the brunt of the climate crisis, to now bear the greater burden of its mitigation.