Next president should address climate change, group says

MANILA, Philippines - The next president of the Philippines should help address climate change and provide leadership that would enable the country to support efforts to limit global warming, an official of an environment advocacy group said.

Mario Molina, director of The Climate Reality Project Leadership Corps, said political will and knowledge are needed to come up with policies on climate change, which he believes is the most important issue confronting the country.  

“Listen to the people and take action on climate as soon as you get in,” Molina said in an interview last Monday when asked for his message to the next president of the Philippines.

“If the intention to address climate change is there, if there is enough leadership in this country, if the Philippine leadership has understanding and knowledge of the issue, then the policies can follow. What is needed is the political will to make those decisions and to make those choices,” he added.

Molina said his group is not in the position to recommend specific policies to the Philippine government. He, however, believes that climate change and disaster resilience should become election issues. 

“Overall it’s not my area of expertise to compare the Philippines with other Asian nations but I think it’s important to support the leaders who are calling for strong climate action especially you have elections coming up,” Molina said.

“I don't think there is another issue more important in the Philippines. The Philippines is most vulnerable country in the world to climate change so to not address it as an election issue would be a big mistake,” he added.

Molina said the direction that the Philippine leadership takes on climate would be very important as this would determine if the country would be able to meet its intended nationally determined contribution (INDC). 

The INDC is a document submitted to the United Nations that details a country’s action plan on mitigating the effects of climate change.

In its INDC, the Philippines vowed to cut carbon emissions by 70 percent by 2030 if it gets assistance like financial resources, technology development and transfer and capability building. Carbon emissions have been linked to global warming, rising sea levels and extreme weather conditions like drought and strong typhoons.

Gore praises Pope Francis

Meanwhile, former United States (US) vice president and environmental activist Al Gore on Monday lauded Pope Francis for his concern for sectors who are vulnerable to the impact of climate change.

Speaking to participants of the Climate Reality Leadership Corps Training in Pasay, Gore joked that he might consider converting to Catholicism because of the pontiff, who has been vocal in advocating for action on climate change.  

“Let me say something about Pope Francis, I’m not a Catholic but I can become a Catholic because of him,” the former US vice president said in jest.   

I’m an admirer of his delivery of message of Jesus Christ. What an incredible leader!” he added.

Gore, a devout Baptist, also agreed with Pope Francis pronouncement that the greatest effects of climate change are suffered by the poor. He noted that the Vatican, the center of the Roman Catholic religion, is the first state to be carbon-neutral.

“They (Vatican) have two advantages. They’re very small and God is on their side," Gore said, drawing laughs from the audience.

In his encyclical Laudato Si or “Praise be to You,” Pope Francis wrote that climate change is real and is caused by human activity.

The leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics also criticized actions that “hurt and mistreated” the planet Earth, which he described as “our common home.”

The 2015 encyclical also cited the need to reduce greenhouse gases and to protect the environment and vulnerable sectors especially the poor.

“When we fail to acknowledge as part of reality the worth of a poor erson, a human embryo, a person with disabilities – to offer just a few examples – it becomes difficult to hear the cry of nature itself; everything is connected,” Pope Francis said in the encyclical.

“I urgently appeal, then, for a new dialogue about how we are shaping the future of our planet. We need a conversation which includes everyone, since the environmental challenge we are undergoing, and its human roots, concern and affect us all,” the pontiff added.