MANILA, Philippines - The provincial government of Albay launched the Climate Change Academy at the conclusion of the Local Government Units Summit +3i on Climate Change held last Nov. 4 to 6 in Legazpi City. The League of Provincial Governors in Luzon, as well as vice-governors, local government legislators and planners, scientists and NGO officers attended the summit. The summit was sponsored by Albay province and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the UN System in the Philippines.
“Essentially, the academy will be a repository of knowledge and expertise on local adaptation practices and a venue for their dissemination,” said Gov. Salceda, who has been declared by the United Nations as a UN senior champion of Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Reduction. “Its academic partners will be Bicol University and University of the Philippines in Los Banos. Bicol University will house the Climate Change Academy, with the Department of Education regional office in Bicol as its operations site. Other committed partners of the Academy include the League of Provinces of the Philippines, the Publishers’ Association of the Philippines, Inc., and the Philippine Network of Environmental Journalists.”
The Climate Change Academy officially took effect after a memorandum of understanding among the Climate Change Commission represented by Sec. Heherson Alvarez, the United Nations System in the Philippines represented by United Nations Development Programme Country Director Renaud Meyer, and Albay’s provincial government led by Gov. Joey Salceda.
For his part, Meyer outlined the ongoing UN and UNDP interventions. “They include READY, a multi-hazard mapping of 27 provinces in the eastern seaboard, as well as the MDG Fund UN Joint Action Programme on Climate Change Adaptation, which aims to mainstream climate change in national and local plans and programs. We are also integrating disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation into local development planning, as well as having an enabling activity for the Philippines’ 2nd National Communication on Climate Change, which has produced national climate change scenarios and vulnerability and adaptation assessment models, as well as a national greenhouse gas inventory. We at the UNDP and the UN System cannot offer solutions but we can provide capacity development, to make informed and enlarged choices, which is at the heart of sustainable development.”
Oriental Mindoro Governor Alfonso Umali led 56 governors of the League of Provinces of the Philippines in crafting an action plan to address climate change adaptation issues to meet their development goals and the country’s commitment to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Along with other development partners, the league also agreed to set up disaster risk reduction management offices in their provinces, cities, and municipalities. The template for this is Albay’s Public Safety and Emergency Management Office (Apsemo).
Apsemo earned for Albay a citation from the United Nations’ Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon as a role model in disaster risk reduction, along with Hyogo Prefecture in Japan and the cities of Bangkok, Bonn, Mexico City and Mumbai.