Jamaica.

How does Jamaica compare in Caribbean?

Scored Caribbean destinations, Eco Index.

The global top 10 of the 77 destinations scored

What is Jamaica particularly good at?

✓ Culture, scored 5/5. The Maroons are the reason Jamaica scores top here. These are communities descended from Africans who freed themselves, held territory against the British and kept their own governance and language. There are three main Windward Maroon communities, Moore Town in the Rio Grande Valley, Charles Town in the Buff Bay Valley and Scotts Hall in the Wag Water Valley, with Accompong the Leeward town in St Elizabeth. The Maroon heritage of Moore Town is inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, for Kromanti ceremonies, the dances, songs and drumming styles that invoke ancestral spirits, a language of African derivation also called Kromanti, and rare medicinal preparations. Accompong marks the 1739 peace treaty between Cudjoe and the British with an annual observance on 6 January, centred on a march to the Kindah Tree. Our sources disagree on the treaty date and on the acreage granted, so we quote neither. One thing to watch. Several Maroon village tours we found were sold by third party resellers rather than by the communities. Book with the community where you can. The Rastafari Indigenous Village is explicitly community led and reservation only.

✓ Heritage, scored 5/5. Jamaica carries a globally influential living culture. Reggae, added to UNESCO's list of intangible heritage, sits alongside ska, mento and dancehall as music still made and danced every day. Rastafari livity, Kumina and Nyabinghi drumming, and Revival Zion keep African rooted spiritual and ancestral traditions alive. The Maroon communities of Accompong and Moore Town maintain Kromanti language, drumming and ancestral practice, and Jonkonnu masquerade still parades at Christmas.

✓ Plant-based eating, scored 5/5. Ital is the real thing: not a menu category but the food practice of a living faith, unprocessed, unsalted and plant based long before the word vegan reached the Caribbean. The Rastafari Indigenous Village outside Montego Bay is community led, has been running for over 19 years, is reservation only and deliberately limits guest numbers, offering an introduction to Rastafari history, herbal healing, Ital food and traditional craft. Coronation Market in downtown Kingston is the main produce market. Be clear eyed about how it works: the government's own food policy describes a system with no dedicated wholesale market, where traders buy in Kingston for resale in their own parishes, which adds cost. The produce is genuinely Jamaican, but it reaches you through a resale chain rather than farmer direct. For a plate of it, Rasta Ade Refreshments sits right on Seven Mile Beach at Negril, a fully plant based Ital kitchen and juice bar run by Michael Vita and head chef Audley Anderson, who is a farmer, so some of what you eat is grown by the kitchen. Jerk hummus, callaloo, ackee, pumpkin and red peas stew, and the Rasta lemonade the place is named for. Cash only, and the food often sells out by mid afternoon, which is the sign of a kitchen cooking what it has rather than what it can reheat.

Where does Jamaica score worst?

✕ Energy, scored 2/5. Jamaica's electricity is still dominated by imported oil and diesel, with renewables supplying only about 10 per cent of generation in 2023, split across wind, solar and a little hydro. Emissions sit at roughly 2.3 tonnes of CO2 per person, low by rich world standards but tied to fossil fuel imports rather than clean supply. The updated climate pledge and a 50 per cent renewable electricity target for 2030 are credible on paper but far from delivered. A dependence on shipped fossil fuel and a slow grid transition keep the island in the fossil reliant band.

✕ Organic farming, scored 2/5. This is the clearest case in the Caribbean of plant based and organic being two different things, which is exactly why we split them. Jamaica has one of the deepest plant based traditions anywhere: Ital is unprocessed, unsalted and plant based as a matter of faith, and it predates the word vegan. What it does not have is certification. Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee is protected as a registered certification mark, but that protects origin and altitude, not growing method. So you can eat superbly here without ever meeting a certified organic label. Buy at the market and ask the grower, because the information exists in conversation rather than on packaging.

✕ Recycling, scored 2/5. Riverton City landfill in Kingston is reported to take over 60 per cent of nationally collected solid waste, at more than 1,000 tonnes a day, and we could not verify a national recycling rate from any source we trust. What Jamaica has done well is the front end rather than the back end: the plastics regime is the most comprehensive in the region and now reaches microbeads. What happens after collection is much less clear, so take what you can home.

Energy, 2/5

Jamaica's electricity is still dominated by imported oil and diesel, with renewables supplying only about 10 per cent of generation in 2023, split across wind, solar and a little hydro. Emissions sit at roughly 2.84 tonnes of CO2 per person, low by rich world standards but tied to fossil fuel imports rather than clean supply.

Consequence: It is the lowest-scoring part of Jamaica's record, so it is where the score moves first.

Food and farming, 4/5

Jamaica is by far the most agriculturally real island in this region. Agriculture is 7.97 per cent of GDP, against 1.55 per cent in Barbados and 0.51 per cent in the Bahamas, and 38.5 per cent of the land is agricultural land, against 1.3 per cent in the Bahamas.

Heritage, 5/5

Jamaica carries a globally influential living culture. Reggae, added to UNESCO's list of intangible heritage, sits alongside ska, mento and dancehall as music still made and danced every day.