Two reactions sprung to mind upon hearing Mott MacDonald’s rather dire appraisal of the state of our natural environment. The first: tell us something we don’t know and, the second, what are we going to do about it? The answer dear reader is nothing, not a jot. The overwhelming majority of those who give a fig about our ecosystems belong to civil society.

Unfortunately, they do not usually find themselves in positions of power and are forced, more often to not, to react to decisions rather than making them. Those who do exert direct influence – government and the private sector – are tragically locked in a mercantilist mindset that perceives the environment as a resource to be exploited like any other, with little or no regard for such niceties as the replenishment capacity of ecosystems and their conservation. This column however is not about the slow, agonizing death of Mother Nature in Mauritius.

No, it’s about a fisherman named Jimmy and the quest for the simple life. He lives in Rodrigues though, so to meet we’ll need to teleport over there. Thankfully, doing so involves a simple hop and a skip of the mind. It’s an overcast afternoon in Graviers, in the South-east of the island, near Anse Femi, to be precise. Atop the rocky outcrop that skirts the cove, spindly filao trees bristle gently in the breeze. It’s low tide and the ocean has receded to beyond the promontory, leaving the seabed looking more than a little exposed. And this is where Jimmy comes in, literally. At the water’s edge, he’s unloading the day’s catch – seven or eight fleshy octopi - from his pirogue. While he removes their livers, which he keeps as bait to catch “cordonnier”, the lanky fisherman gives me a brief outline of his life story.

A native of Cité-La-Chaux, Mahebourg, he went over to Rodrigues with a friend to try to earn a living in a “less competitive” environment. After a month or so, his sidekick decided to head back to Mauritius. Given that had been staying with relatives of the latter, the future looked uncertain for Jimmy until a fortuitous encounter with an elderly fisherman in Graviers who took our protagonist under his arm. That was seven years ago. Since then, Jimmy has succeeded in getting himself a little house in the foothills near the village. He fishes and tends animals. More importantly he’s happy. “This is what Blue-Bay looked like when I was growing up”, he says tracing an arc along the shoreline with his hand. “Now it’s been disfigured beyond recognition”. Taking in the stunning beauty of the site, I can see why moving to Graviers feels so right for him.

Indeed, for those of us who care about this country, seeing what it’s become is profoundly depressing. And the magnitude of the onslaught is such that any resistance is all but futile. Things will only change when our current model of development comes crashing down. In the meantime however doing a Jimmy, or moving somewhere that still values the sanctity of nature and the intrinsic simplicity of life, rather their potential monetary worth, is arguably the best option. I ask Jimmy whether he’s worried that Rodrigues will go the way of Mauritius. “I’ll be far away by then”, he answers. “Agalega?”, I enquire naively. He simply nods his head and points to the sky.