SAY GREEN ADVOCATES

Global warming may turn RP into water world

By Tarra Quismundo Philippine Daily Inquirer Filed Under: Environmental Issues MANILA, Philippines -- Half of Naga City submerged along with five eastern towns of the Bicol region, and between 20 million to 30 million turned into environment refugees across the Philippines. Speaking of the countrys own inconvenient truth, environmentalists painted this grim forecast at a conference on climate change and conflict at the Asian Institute of Management's Policy Center on Tuesday. The scenario may well happen within the century if people continue to disregard the consequences of a warmer planet, they said. They shared science-backed forecasts of the Philippines at a time when ice caps surrender to a warmer Earth. Nereus Acosta, convener of the Philippine Climate Change Initiative and former Bukidnon congressman, said a meter higher of sea levels will submerge 15 of the country's 17 regions, with the northern highlands as the only areas spared from the catastrophe. The Philippines as an archipelago is considered a climate hotspot ... with 20 out of 80 provinces vulnerable to a one meter rise in sea level, said Acosta in a presentation before an audience of 60 listeners, among them officers from the environment and energy departments, the academe and nongovernment organizations. Acosta said provinces in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), the Zamboanga Peninsula, Eastern Visayas and the Bicol region, incidentally those with the higher poverty incidence and greatest food insecurity in the Philippines, are among places to be worst hit by widespread flooding because of global sea-level rise. With these regions affected, there will be 20 (million) to 30 million people who will be dislocated, they will become environmental refugees who will be fighting for scarce resources, said Acosta in an interview. Acosta based his estimates on published international studies on climate change, including that of the Nobel prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and James Hansen, a climate scientist with the United States' National Aeronautics and Space Administration, who studied carbon dioxide emission levels worldwide. At one point, Acosta cracked a joke just to break the silence of the audience. Maybe our 7,100 islands will be reduced to 6,000 because we will be under a permanent high tide. And in the Cordilleras, maybe the New People's Army will change its name to the New People's Navy. Asked how imminent such life threat is, Acosta said: In 20 to 50 years, if you go by the science, even by Europe. And James Hansen said we have crossed the borderline level of CO2 emissions. Carbon dioxide, chiefly emissions from automobiles and industry, has long been identified as the primary contributor to a warmer planet. Hansen, as Acosta cited, has found that CO2 trapped in the planet is at a dangerous tipping point of 385 parts per million. Studies have shown that temperature rise could lead to extreme weather, including stronger typhoons, drought, heat waves and heavy flooding. Joyce Palacol, ecology program coordinator at the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines' National Secretariat for Social Action Justice and Peace (CBCP-NASSA), meanwhile told the stunned audience that just a half-meter rise in sea levels will inundate the eastern half of Camarines Sur in the Bicol region.

Using a map, Palacol showed how half on Naga City and surrounding towns in the eastern part of Camarines Sur would be inundated by waters from the Philippine Sea with just a .5-meter rise in sea level. CBCP-NASSA studies have also showed a continuing and rising rate of depletion of Philippine natural resources, he said. In the last century, forest-covered land shrank from 70 to 80 percent in the 1900s to 18 percent in 2002. Of the remaining greens, less than three percent is original forest cover and the rest was salvaged through reforestation, Palacol said. From 1918 to 1997, Philippine mangrove areas were reduced to 24.7 percent, most of which lost to conversion into fish ponds. Palacol did not give an estimate loss but he said coral reefs, home to the country's diverse marine life, have been degraded by cyanide, dynamite and commercial fishing. Climate change is a moral issue and the CBCP is undertaking these studies under its role to protect the integrity of creation, Palacol said. A study by International Alert, a global non-government organization for peace-building, placed the Philippines among 46 nations facing a high risk of armed conflict as a knock-on consequence of climate change. The list included nations currently experiencing conflict, including Iran, Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Nepal, Rwanda, Somalia, Sierra Leone, and other African, Middle Eastern and Asian states. In the Philippine edition its publication A Climate of Conflict: The Links Between Climate Change, Peace and War, International Alert cautioned: There is a real risk that climate change will compound the propensity for violent conflict, which in turn will leave communities poorer, less resilient and less able to cope with the consequences of climate change. The organization estimated that some 2.7 billion people in these countries will suffer the effects of climate-aggravated violence. Some 56 other countries were identified to be at a high risk of facing political instability because of climate change, among them nations in Latin America, poorer nations in Europe and even powerful states such as North Korea, Russia and Saudi Arabia. ... *I+t is safe to predict that the consequences of climate change will combine with other factors to put additional strain on already fragile social and political systems. These are the conditions in which conflicts flourish and cannot be resolved without violence because governments are arbitrary, inept and corrupt, said International Alert's November 2007 report that was released in Manila Tuesday. It added: If the relationship between climate change and violent conflict is not addressed, there will be a vicious circle of failure to adapt to climate change, worsening the risk of violent conflict and, in turn, reducing further the ability to adapt. Notably absent on both lists are richer nations such as the United States, which science has identified to be the largest contributor to the world's carbon emissions, China, another big-time energy consumer, and the United Kingdom, among others. For a state to adapt and avert violence, International Alert's senior policy advisor Edmundo Garcia advocated the development of a resilient society through spreading climate change awareness and engaging government and civil society in constant dialog.