The Philosopher Socrates said that there is an honourable and shameful way of bestowing wisdom. To offer wisdom to all comers for money is philosophically prostitution.

There is well-paid growth industry in the Caribbean known as environmental consultancy. The consultant sell their environmental knowledge to "developers" for money, focusing mainly on securing their own economic success.

Such acquisitive, self-regarding approach does not facilitate sustainable development. Do those consultants have a moral right to cash-in on the intrinsic valve of the environment? They obviously are not concerned by ethics, or long term consequences nor does reality interest them.  What matters is their ability to get what they want.

In a free democracy, those consultants do not appear to have any eco political objectives. What implications are they afraid of? It is a fact that a political problem needs a political solution. In government¹s desperate quest for economic development, the protection of the environment is invariably compromised.

Morally we are facing an environmental crisis. This crisis emerged from a lack of adherence to moral principles. The philosopher Thomas Nagel said, moral argument tries to appeal to a capacity for impartial motivation which is supposed to be present in all of us.

Unfortunately, it may be deeply buried, and in some cases it may not be present at all. In the absence, governments with moral authority, public pressure is a key factor in protecting the environment. In the case of Grenada, I must acknowledge the efforts of  Sandra Ferguson, Judy Williams, Anselm Clouden, Arley Gill, Joseph Antoine, Glen Noel and others, who openly challenge the government¹s development strategy with respect to environmental enhancement and protection.

Knowledge is a responsibility for the integrity of what we are as ethical creature. Therefore, we must devise ethical strategies or systems of values to ensure that what is attractive in the short term is weighed in the balance of the ultimate, long-term satisfaction. Indeed, this is what sustainable development is all about. A word to the wise should be enough.