According to the will of the Swedish industrialist and inventor Alfred Nobel, the Peace Prize should be awarded "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between the nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses". The award of the Nobel Peace Prize to former U.S. Vice-President Albert Arnold Gore and the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has brought environmental issues to centre stage in global political affairs.

Because of the careful scholarship of the IPCC, a U.N. panel of over 3,000 scientists, there are few who today doubt that human industrial activity usually linked with 'progress' and 'development' is at the root of recent changes in climactic patterns across the globe; the increase in the number and intensity of hurricanes, droughts and floods, and gradually rising seas together threaten living conditions across the world, and may prompt mass migrations and increase the risk of wars. This link between industrialisation and unsustainable development has been dubbed an "inconvenient truth" by Al Gore, who has campaigned tirelessly since 2000 to create global awareness and acceptance of the need for urgent environmental action. This step by the Nobel committee must now transfer ecological issues from the fringe to the mainstream of global, national and local discourse.

In Jamaica, environmental issues are decidedly not on centre stage, and Jamaican governments are not known for handing out kudos and national awards to ecological activists. Rather, various governments and private interests have treated environmentalists as troublemakers and malcontents on the fringe, and as obstacles to national progress because of objections they have raised to various projects. These environmentalists would claim, we are sure, that their concerns contain as many truths inconvenient to local authorities as Al Gore's are inconvenient to the powers further north.

Let us hope that this honour bestowed upon the environmental community by the Nobel organisation will translate into urgent action by nations, communities and firms to mitigate the negative aspects of industrial development on the climate of the world. Jamaica, with most of her population living near the coast, will suffer more serious effects from global climate change than larger continental countries.

Opinion polls show that environmental awareness and concern across the Jamaican society is lower than elsewhere. As a nation we have fallen behind in our legal framework, and our record in enforcing the laws we do have which might guarantee an environmentally sustainable society is poor. It is time that the Jamaican Government and the wider society examine seriously the issues raised by the environmental community, no matter how inconvenient their arguments may be. If they are right, the very survival of our economy and way of life may depend on it.