Experts who warned insurance leaders of the dire consequences of climate change believe their message is finally getting through.

The topic of global warming and its associated risks was a key focus area of the World Insurance Forum (WIF) in Dubai - and that very fact is enough to convince Anthony Knap, director of the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Studies (BIOS), that at least some in the industry are taking the environmental threat seriously.

"For the organisers to pick this topic and to make it so prominent in the event, that was a statement in itself,"

Dr. Knap said, after speaking at a WIF session entitled "Exploring Man's Impact on the Global Environment".

Although much time had been wasted by an unnecessarily protracted debate over whether global warming was actually occurring and then whether it was down to human activity, the science had long since overwhelmed the doubts, Dr. Knap said.

Businesses could implement changes needed to combat global warming and have a real impact, he added.

"I tried to get the message across in a speech I gave at the World Economic Forum 14 years ago," Dr. Knap said.

"The eyes of the audience glazed over. They just didn't get it.

"Now the reaction is very different. The more we can get in front of a business audience, the better. These are people who pay money to fund political parties and if we get them to understand it, then it's possible to get things done quicker.

"Also, there's is a huge business opportunity in finding ways to solve this climate problem and if people don't get that, they shouldn't be in business."

Earlier in the Forum, Lord Patten, in his keynote address, said climate change was one of the five biggest risks facing the world. And renowned futurologist Dr. James Martin, who has a home in Bermuda, told delegates that the rate of warming would be exacerbated by the loss of an area of forest the size of Belgium every year.

Dr. Charles Kennell, professor of atmospheric science at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, said it was vital that the insurance industry understood the impact of climate change.

"These people are very sophisticated about estimating the risks of the future and if they don't get it, we're in trouble," Dr. Kennell said.

He added that businesses, as well as their customers, had a major role to play in the battle against environmental abuse.

"One by one, people will stand up and say things have to be done differently and we will reach a tipping point of public opinion," Dr. Kennell said. "You can see the effects of this already. Banks are making themselves carbon-neutral because that is what more and more of their customers want. In Europe, people want clean and green businesses. There is plenty of money financing that, because they want to show they are good citizens of the planet."

He gave the example of Wells Fargo Bank, one of the biggest lenders to the US agricultural sector, which which is moving towards requiring environmentally friendly practices are followed by the farmers it lends money to.And he pointed to an actuarial survey at a Chicago bank that found that if home loans were increased to meet an added requirement that insulation be put into the house, the consequent savings on heating bills increased the probability that the loan would be repaid.

Bermuda has good reasons to be a significant player in helping to combat global warming, Dr. Kennell said. "First, it's an island, and so understands its vulnerability," he said. "Second, it's home to the greatest collection of risk assessors in the world, people who are risking their own money. Thirdly, it has BIOS, which has a 54-year record of open-ocean measurements, the longest span of such data in the world."

In comments during the environmental session, Dr. Kennel said: "The warming of the last 30 years has been the greatest we know about in the past 1,000 years."

Dr. Knap said: "This affects every human being on Earth and it's caused by every human being. Every single individual, in his work and his life, has a role to play. It's true for the insurance industry and it's true for all of us."