MANILA – President Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos has pressed the panic button on concern for climate change as his office has proposed 453.1 billion pesos in funding in addressing it at his leadership moment.
What does the action of President Marcos convey?
With ramped efforts to respond to climate change, President Marcos wants the Philippine government in the forefront in implementing “climate change action results” responsive to needs of Filipinos and other neighboring Asians, as well.
Coming on the heels of the message of President Marcos that climate change must resonate with every Filipino, World Bank (WB) has taken full cognizance of the action of the Philippine government in the fight against climate change.
Focusing on climate commitments, policies and capacities, WB noted, “The Philippine has developed comprehensive set of policies and institutions to address climate change with a whole government approach.”
Approach by the Philippine government on climate change was threshed out in the “Philippine Country Climate and Development Report, (PCCDR)” of WB launched November 9, first part of report published synthesized by Herald Express in its November 20 issue.
Herald Express’s Daily Laborer columnist was invited prior to the launching in Manila but due to previous engagements, attended online.
On such score, Philippine government policy banks on adaptation, with mitigation action to be pursued largely as function of adaptation, WB said.
Such being the move, the updated Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) of the country commits to a 75 per cent reduction in cumulative emissions by 2030, to include forestry and land-use change, relative to so-called business-as-usual cumulative emissions of 3,340 tons of carbon footprint.
Of the carbon tonnage, the Philippine commits to shoulder 2.71 per cent of the proposed reduction which will be unconditional and without external support. The portion of unconditional reduction of the NDC is likely to be easily met under business-as-usual conditions.
Of the conditional reduction portion of NDC, WB noted while it may be highly ambitious it can also likely be realized if net emissions are reduced to zero before 2030, taking note of a moratorium on endorsing new Greenfield coal-fired plants which was announced in 2020.
NDC recognizes that the private sector plays a crucial role in meeting growing demand for climate action, particularly now at the present case whereby the Covid-19 pandemic stretched public finances. Hence, climate actions will be in the direct interest of the private sector that can translate into USD168 billion between 2020 and 2030.
Investment opportunities by the private sector exist in ventures like greening the energy, the Philippine agriculture, and transportation, manufacturing and helping build climate-smart cities or communities, nation-wide.
Climate change is expected to affect water availability in all parts of the country; hence, there is imperative need to increase water storage capacity that will increase population resilience, PCCDR emphasized, taking notice that per storage capacity in the Philippines stand at 68 m3 as of 2017, well behind neighboring countries like Vietnam (473m3), Malaysia (722 m3) and Thailand, (1,145 m3).
Regional precipitation levels vary and difficult to predict as climate change increases. However, the Philippines fully recognize Nature-Based Solutions can help manage precipitation levels and has often encouraged reforestation efforts both at government and private sectors.
Climate-related disasters continuously have a sizable negative impact on public fiancés in the country prodding the government to adopt a National Disaster Risk Finance and Insurance (DRFI) strategy, a key milestone in improving financial planning for disasters.
PCCDR mentioned that the Philippine government continues to roll out new components of this layered DRFI and its implementation has already shown benefits in ensuring more resilience to climate disasters.
Reforestation, viewed in scope by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in the PCCDR, potentially offer multiple adaptation and mitigation benefits by increasing infiltration to reduce the risk of dry season water scarcity, reducing runoff to lower risk of rainy season floods and reducing erosion while preserving capacity water reservoir storage.
In fact, reforestation is seen as capably allowing for the sequestration of significant amounts of carbon in biomass and soils.
PCCDR recommended, too, the removal of obstacles to private-sector participation in the water sector. However, the Philippine government is not keen on this idea.
Not yet, anyway. As in the present state, current tariff policies, political pressure and consumer scowl for the private sector participation on this area discourage private investment.
A good case given is the situation in Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) whereby indigenous highlanders demand direct participation and acceptable benefits in the development of their water resources. Doing otherwise can alienate large communities in CAR.
As with other utilities, foreign equity in water and sanitation companies in the Philippines is limited to 40 per cent.
While agriculture was traced by the report as accounting for a quarter of national emissions from methane and nitrous oxide, and not increasing, PCCDR emphasized this sector remains critically important for food security, employment and poverty reduction in the face of climate change.
From a macro perspective, the report recommended adaptation measures in climate-proofing, to protect agricultural infrastructure from typhoons that do a big proportion of agricultural damage.
Agriculture contributes about 10 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and nationally employs around 26 per cent of the economically-active population.
Climate-Smart agriculture (CSA), on the other hand, was ticked by the PCCDR in government approach to raising food system productivity, bringing resilience and lowering emission. Smart approaches like Alternative Wetting and Drying (AWD) technique is a water-saving technology Philippine farmers can adopt to reduce water use by as much as 25-28 per cent and cutting methane and nitrous oxide emissions by up to 60 – 70 per cent.
As to the power sector, PCCDR scrutinized retail electricity tariffs in the Philippines are way 30-40 per cent higher than Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) average. Apparently, the Philippines is one of few countries in the region where the government does not control domestic prices of energy products except for targeted social aid.
Still, it is well that the Philippines is embarking to scale up renewable energy and phase out investments in new coal-fired power plants. However, no timelaine has been decided for phasing out.
Urbanization and economic population growth have led to rapid growth in motorization in the Philippines, PCCDR said. On this part, the government needs to implement the low carbon development program which will reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions from transport, even if it is much less than the NDC target implies.
Even if fully implemented, the low carbon program may reduce emission only by 45 metric tons of carbon dioxide by 2030, as compared with the 301 metric tons needed for unconditional NDC.
Low carbon transport interventions would reduce GHG emissions and bring significant local benefits. Presently, the government is encouraging the private sector’s participation on this, through the Electric Vehicle Industry Act of 2022 to promote production and use of electric motor vehicles.
Almost half of Filipinos live in urban areas, the proportion increasing. And so is the major source of emissions. Here, there is need for increasing energy efficiency of buildings, which PCCDR thinks as critical since the building sector accounts for 54 per cent of total power consumption in the country.
Green buildings, for example, have lower impact on climate change and these can cope with higher temperature with few energy requirements than conventional structures.
Looking at the overall impact of Philippine mitigation steps, PCCDR hints such contributions can be considered “small but potentially positive, with around 0.5 per cent increase in GDP. Mitigation steps can also increase local employment by nearly 80,000 additional jobs by 2030.
PCCDR hinted that while climate change significantly threatens Philippine development, the country has many options available to reduce risks. However, left unaddressed, extreme weather events and slow- onset climate changes would significantly lower economic growth and well-being of Filipinos.
Already, the Philippines started to undertake a range of responses. In some cases, solutions simply require scaling up or fully implementing responses rather than developing entirely new ones.
PCCDR said that while investments in climate change responses are substantial, the country can accommodate it in its yearly budgets, representing a small increase over the normal productive investments.
“Crucially, many of these investments are in the direct interest of individual actors or can be made so by appropriate regulatory and fiscal policy changes,” PCCDR stressed.
President Marcos, having enjoined lately neighboring nations to help ensure climate-resilient economies has placed the Philippines on the roadmap of environmental protection by having stressed, “We accept our share of responsibility and will continue to do our part to avert this collective disaster.”
Robert Borje, Vice-chair of the Philippine Climate Commission who was present during the release of the WB PCCDR last November 9 also stated, “To give our people the environment we deserve, we need to do more for the least responsible for climate change, those with the least resources, and those who are most vulnerable and at risk.”
