CLIMATE change now defines the global landscape, determining how the world formulates development policies, how mankind shapes the future, and how people design sustainable lifestyles, with many countries, for example, banning disposable plastic food containers.
Guyana stands on an interesting pedestal regarding climate change, because here is one of the world’s most promising oil-and-gas countries, simultaneously housing over 80 per cent of its landmass with lush, green virgin forests neighbouring the Amazon region. In Vice-President Bharrat Jagdeo, Guyana boasts a leader who became one of the outstanding Caribbean and South American advocates on the global climate change front when he served this nation as President. Indeed, the Guyana Government built a strong international reputation over the years for being in the forefront of the climate change agenda. Guyana was the first country in the world to sign a forestry agreement with Norway to preserve the natural environment and to operate the forestry sector through sustainable methods.

The Amerindian communities are well versed and expert at preserving the natural ecosystem and the raw environment and in farming with sustainable methods. Guyana is green and lush and sunny and breezy, its natural environment, a global marvel of man co-existing with nature in a harmonious way. Trees abound across the land, from coast to coast, decorating villages from the coastland to the hinterland, and in Georgetown the trees along Main Street are old and ancient, yet flourishing with bright aesthetic greenery. Even in the mangrove trees serving as sea defence, one sees that Guyana is not only the land of many waters and rivers and waterfalls, but also the land of nature, of a kaleidoscope of flora and fauna and of forest floors teeming with wildlife and exotic species and a brilliant galaxy of animals, birds and reptiles that make the ecosystem alive, organic, breathing fresh oxygen into the earth’s atmosphere.
Guyana would do well to operate a special public relations platform that showcases its natural beauty and raw ecosystem to the world, and that educates and entertains Guyanese about the wonder of their country. Just about all of the country’s resorts take advantage of this natural beauty to operate tourist destinations and experiences that are the best ecotourism resorts in the Caribbean.

In taking stock of where the country is today, of knowing the possibilities for tomorrow, of auditing the national assets and resources that position Guyana’s unique offering to the 21st century global village, the nation would do well to develop a multimedia outlay, write and design and draw up a great story around its natural beauty and ecosystem underbelly.
The United States space agency, NASA, reported this week that the year 2020 ranks as the hottest year on record on earth. That is a sobering wake-up call for the world. And global leaders are taking urgent action, with the Paris Climate Agreement under intentional implementation around the world. The 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations now underway, with oversight from The Elders organisation, aim to create a new global order that functions precisely to clean up the earth’s pollution and to curb the excessive carbon footprint of the Industrial Age over the past 100 years.

Guyana is one of the few countries in today’s world that is blessed with a rich oil-and-gas industry, while simultaneously hosting a vibrant, alive organic natural ecosystem on much of its landmass. The Guiana Shield, running parallel to the Atlantic coast and spanning Guyana, Venezuela, Brazil and Suriname, is shaping up to be the mecca of the 21st century, with oil and gas and the natural ecosystem co-existing. It is imperative that policy makers make this a workable, symbiotic relationship, with harmony between the oil-and-gas sector and the natural ecosystem being the uppermost consideration in development of the oil-and-gas sector’s economic promises.

Environmentalists are starting to grumble that the oil-and-gas sector may damage the purity of Guyana’s natural environment. Whilst it would be an important checkpoint to cultivate a good watchdog movement for matters of the natural environment, the country needs to be careful that these concerns do not become paranoia and extremism. The oil-and-gas sector and the natural environment could co-exist with technology causing an alignment that fuels the socioeconomic development of the society, at the same time as the natural environment flourishes under the magnificent Guyana sun. This balance is crucial for the country to cultivate and maintain.
The Iwokrama initiative serves the nation well and its contribution to science and to research is invaluable. The nation would also do well to showcase this area of Guyana to the world with more deliberate focus on this country as a natural wonder, and a scientific one at that.

Isn’t it a brilliant blessing for this nation that it is one of the world’s rare treasure houses in this 21st century global village, housing a rich, promising oil-and-gas sector, alongside one of the global village’s most interesting, vibrant, alive, organic and fascinating ecosystem on the planet?
Guyanese live in one of the world’s most treasured lands today, and government would accomplish a great service to the country to engineer a social space for citizens to celebrate their good fortune. Indeed, in the world of climate change, Guyana is one of the glamourous countries in the world.