Above: Jamaican Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Continuing what has been a major stated priority of her administration, Jamaican Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller is urging regional leaders to give “serious consideration” to the development of a Caribbean-wide strategy on climate change.

Simpson Miller, who addressed the CELAC summit in Havana last week, said that climate change required immediate attention “based on the principle of common, but differentiated responsibility.”

“Climate change is not a scientific theory, which may occur in the future,” Simpson Miller said. “Climate change is here and we face it now. It poses clear and present danger to our continued development and threatens to erode our hard won socio-economic gains.”

Simpson Miller to the recent tragic storms in the Eastern Caribbean as a “prime example” of the impact the phenomenon can have on small economies.

“We must never underestimate the potentially irreversible damage which a natural disaster can wreak on a small economy, even after pursuing sustained and responsible economic management policies,” she said.

The Caribbean is one of the regions in the world most vulnerable to the potential effects of a changing climate.