Loss and damage from Hurricane Melissa, which rampaged through western Jamaica in late October, is now being estimated in excess of US$12 billion.

At last count, at least 45 people were said to have died in the Category 5 storm, classified among the worst natural disasters in Jamaica’s recorded history.

The truth is that many people in the island’s west still aren’t even close to picking up the pieces and getting their lives back together. Much the same is true for service providers, wider industry and some public utilities.

Inevitably then, the hurricane, its consequences, and what’s to be done, have been central themes in the ongoing budget debate, with Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness making his presentation at the time this commentary was being written on Thursday afternoon.

Like many others in Jamaica and elsewhere, we’ve been struck by the ever-worsening impact of climate extremes over time.

Experts have blamed carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels by the great industrial nations over the last 200 to 300 years for the rapidly evolving and worsening climate episodes.

For sure, Jamaicans, so often spared, have been hit hard over the past two years. In June/July 2024 Hurricane Beryl wreaked havoc through the south-eastern and northern Caribbean leaving at least seven deaths and massive material destruction.

Beryl sideswiped Jamaica’s south coast on July 4 without coming ashore. It was unprecedented in terms of how early in the hurricane season it gained Category 5 status, and speed with which it grew from tropical storm to hurricane.

It was said to be the first Category 5 hurricane to hit the Caribbean that early in more than 100 years of record keeping. Record high sea surface temperatures said to be a consequence of global warming driven by human industrial activity was the trigger, experts say.

Then came Hurricane Melissa, which formed in late October 2025 — the tail end of the traditional Atlantic Hurricane Season.

As described by People’s National Party President and Opposition Leader Mark Golding, Melissa was “a tropical storm system which, while meandering slowly in the Caribbean, intensified rapidly in these waters where sea temperatures have reached 1.4 degrees above pre-industrial levels, and then moved directly to Jamaica.

“It is generally accepted that Melissa’s peculiar intensification and power were a climate-related phenomenon…”

We agree with Mr Golding that Jamaica, like others to have suffered climate-related catastrophes such as Melissa, should press for compensation and restitution from the rich and powerful whose carbon emissions have been a trigger.

Of course, that’s easier said than done. In our world, voices of the small and weak are increasingly being muted and disregarded.

But as Mr Golding argued in Parliament this week, last year’s landmark, advisory judgment by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has left the door ajar, even as we acknowledge that the ICJ’s advisory opinion is not technically legally binding in much the same way, as a treaty.

In summary the ICJ suggested that nation states are obliged to act with due diligence to protect the natural environment from greenhouse emissions; and further that, if obligations are breached, offending nations should incur legal responsibility including potential reparation.

Not just in self-interest but in defence of our planet, Jamaica and other small, weak, vulnerable nations should strive — even against great odds — to kick that door wide open.