‘Climate change a matter of life and death’ – PHL Commissioner

The Philippine delegation to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) round of talks in Panama said on Wednesday that Filipinos are fighting for survival amid worsening climate change, citing the two recent typhoons that battered the country consecutively in a span of just two weeks.

“Millions of Filipinos are already suffering yet we are only seeing initial climate change impacts. Progress must be made in the climate treaty negotiations,” said Commissioner Naderev “Yeb” Saño of the Climate Change Commission (CCC) in a statement.

“We are here in Panama to tell the world that climate change is a matter of life and death for the Philippines,” Saño said.

The CCC is leading the Philippine delegation in the Panama round, which Saño pointed out “has enormous implications on the success or failure of the Durban Climate Change Summit in November.”

With Saño are officials from several departments, as well as several advisers from civil society groups.

The Panama Climate Change Conference runs from Oct. 1 to 7, and is expected to set the tone for the Conference of the Parties to be held in Durban, South Africa by the end of the year.

The Philippines is pushing for progress concerning the future of the Kyoto Protocol and pursuing drastic emissions reduction commitments from developed countries in order to avert global climate catastrophe.

Global treaty on greenhouse gases

The Kyoto Protocol is the international treaty that mandates industrialized countries to cut greenhouse gas emissions to achieve stabilization of the global climate system.

“Common national interests are at stake in the Panama round. Non-government groups in Manila are not merely cheering for the national squad but working actively to support the Philippine climate team in Panama,” said Ignacio Sayajon of the Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities (iCSC).

The United States, the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, remains the only nation to reject the Kyoto Protocol. Last year, several countries, including Canada, Japan, and Russia announced their withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol in late 2010.

Scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a UN-backed scientific body, have warned that greenhouse gas emissions must peak and decline no later than 2015.

According to the IPCC, without drastic emissions reduction measures, damage from climate change may become irreversible with intensified storms and flooding, extreme droughts, and accelerated sea-level rise. —MRT/ELR, GMA News