SBC: Climate change

Showing posts with label Climate change. Show all posts

Jul 25, 2012

ASEAN - Asean urged to take strong position on climate change

Environmental groups, diplomats and government officials have urged member-countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) to come up with a firm stand on pursuing solutions to climate change to ensure that the region would be able to cope with what they fear is a looming environmental crisis. They cited the Asean’s vulnerability to climate change, which is seen to seriously affect most aspects of livelihood and limit the regional bloc’s future development options.

“Asean countries are highly at risk but we are less prepared. We have to come up with a strong stand on the urgency of the issue and develop an action plan to better understand and respond to climate change,” Orlando Mercado, a former senator and former Philippine ambassador to the Asean, said. Mercado is now the secretary-general of the Eastern Regional Organization for Public Administration (Eropa).

Mercado, a speaker during a forum on climate change for Southeast Asian diplomats, government officials and civil-society representatives held at the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) last week, told the BusinessMirror that there is a greater need for the Asean to be resilient to climate change and support national and global efforts to fight it.

“A stronger common Asean stand [on climate change] is still possible. It is also imperative,” he said.

Asean groups the Philippines, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Nirawan Pipitsombat, head of the Climate Change Office of the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources in Thailand, said that while Asean has attempted to draw a common statement for several years already, the member-countries of the regional bloc should support each other on arriving at solutions to address climate change.

“We have failed several times to come up with a common stand but I do believe that we have to support each other on how to implement the Asean’s action plans to combat climate change such as prioritizing actions on adaptation [and] identifying and studying vulnerable sites and other environmental problems,” Pipitsombat added.

Zelda Soriano, political adviser of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, also urged the Asean member-countries to set aside conflict and act together to address the environmental challenges facing the region.

“Our region is faced with so many environmental risks and problems and we need to consolidate our efforts to find out regional solutions to address climate change. Agreeing on a low-carbon development framework in its regional economic integration is the opportunity for the Asean governments to address the particular vulnerability of the region to climate impact without compromising economic development,” Soriano said.

Riza Bernabe, policy and research adviser of Oxfam in Southeast Asia, said past climate-change negotiations failed to deliver on the crucial issue of ensuring concrete sources of funds to fill the $100-billion Green Climate Fund (GCF), a mechanism to help developing countries adapt to climate change and curb carbon emissions.

“While we are happy to see that some countries support efforts to get the GCF up and running, the fund up to now remains an empty shell. We need a reliable and predictable flow of money going into the fund to help us combat climate change,” Bernabe added.

IMELDA V. ABAÑO

http://businessmirror.com.ph/

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Dec 14, 2011

Singapore - Climate deal just a 'plan to make a plan'

It has been hailed by some as ground-breaking for getting all countries to agree to work together.

But environmental NGOs, or non-governmental organisations, in Singapore are not enamoured with the outcome of the recently concluded United Nations climate talks in Durban, South Africa.

On top of harbouring little hope that the annual conference would yield a legally binding agreement for all nations, they say the deal to work towards such an agreement is hardly ambitious enough to protect the world from irreversible climate change.

"The agreement is fundamentally a plan to make a plan, and it can only be hailed as a success once a legally binding deal has been officially adopted," said a sceptical Jose Raymond, executive director of the Singapore Environment Council.

More than 190 countries at the talks agreed on Sunday to a road map towards a global, legally binding accord for countries to cut their greenhouse-gas emissions.

If the pact gets the go-ahead as scheduled in 2015, it will take effect from 2020.

Conservation International Singapore senior adviser Michael Totten was slightly more optimistic.

"The good news about the Durban climate negotiations is they didn't break down; the bad news is that action was delayed for years," he said.

Singapore Institute of International Affairs researcher Henrick Tseng commented that the deal, achieved only after talks stretched into some 30 hours of overtime and ended on Sunday morning at 6am (noon Singapore time), was "not particularly ambitious".

Prior to the talks, Mr Tseng had expressed pessimism in view of developed nations' reluctance to commit to a second round of emissions cuts.

Now, again, he was concerned that developed nations might reject further commitments en masse.

"A crisis of confidence in the Durban road map could erupt and the US, China and India will find less incentive to cooperate in forging and binding themselves to a global treaty," he said.

The three countries are the world's biggest emitters, accounting for nearly half of total emissions. They have been reluctant to commit to cuts: China and India because they feel they need room to develop, and the US because it wants all countries to commit before it will do so.

Environmental consultant Eugene Tay agreed, explaining that there is also the risk that countries may pass an agreement but not ratify it, he said, much like what the United States did with the Kyoto Protocol.

The US signed the Protocol in 1998 but has never ratified it, meaning it is not bound by the legal agreement.

Yet, current science indicates the world is on track for at least a 3.5 deg C temperature rise, more than the goal of capping global warming at 2 deg C to stave off the impact of climate change.

To address that, Mr Tay said, individual governments should do more. For instance, South Korea is about to pass a law requiring "cap and trade", the capping of emissions and then trading of emissions allowances.

And Singapore has said it will cut emissions by 7to 11 per cent by 2020, if no global binding deal is reached, and by 16 per cent if one is.

Mr Totten feels business could play a significant role. For example, electronics giant ST Microelectronics announced its plans in 1998 to emit zero net greenhouse gases by last year, and accomplished this through energy efficiency, renewable energy use and carbon offsets.

This is something Singapore is beginning to do as well. A proposed Energy Conservation Act will require heavy industrial users of energy to improve their efficiency and appoint energy managers.

Mr Billet Hoontrakul, director of youth energy-issues group Energy Carta, said: "We can't afford to wait for governments to come to an agreement. We have to demand it from the ground level."

The group is trying to make sustainable business attractive to young people as a career, added the 20-year-old, a second-year engineering student at the National University of Singapore.

It is also working on a board game to help young people understand the complexities of climate negotiations and motivate them to act and to call for their governments to do the same.

Grace Chua

The Straits Times

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Dec 6, 2011

China - Only more hot air expected

Beijing (China Daily/ANN) - As the last United Nations conference on climate change before the expiry of the Kyoto Protocol in 2012, the ongoing conference in Durban, South Africa, bears people's hopes that all world members will uphold their responsibilities for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

However, a new global economic recession since the onset of this year, the high unemployment rate in the United States, the increased risk of the collapse of the euro amid the deteriorating debt crisis in some eurozone countries and political unrest across the world, have cast a long shadow over the prospects of the Durban meeting.

The key to success at the Durban conference lies in whether or not participating countries can reach an agreement on a second commitment period of the outgoing Kyoto Protocol. This will lay the groundwork for any international talks on climate change. Otherwise, any meaningful action on emissions reduction will be out of the question. Failing to agree a second commitment period will be the equivalent of discarding the Kyoto Protocol and will produce significant adverse long-term effects on any international talks on climate change.

So far, a majority of Annex 1 countries - mainly industrialized countries - have failed to fully fulfill their emission reduction commitments as demanded by the first commitment period of the protocol. In this context, the failure to reach a deal on the second commitment period will result in the absence of a legally binding document that commits all parties to continue to fulfill their unfinished commitments in the years ahead.

The Durban conference should also try to take substantial steps towards guaranteeing funds to help impoverished countries deal with climate change, transform their economic growth modes and embark on a low-carbon and green development path.

Developing countries have stressed many times that they need a growing amount of funds every year to press ahead with these. Developed countries should also make some institutional arrangements to help small and impoverished nations which lack enough political, economic and systematic capacity, to follow a low-carbon and green development path.

In recent years, developed countries have raised their calls for developing countries to undertake a bigger role in the reduction of global GHG emissions. Data shows that in 1990, industrialized nations accounted for more than 70 percent of the globe's GHG emissions, but their proportion had declined to 50 percent by 2010. The developing countries' proportion of global GHG emissions is expected to increase to 70 percent somewhere between 2040 and 2050. However, the increased proportion of emissions by developing countries will not change the fact that their per capita emission volume is still far below that of their developed counterparts.

So far, major developing countries such as China, India, Brazil and South Africa have formulated their own programs for further emission reductions, in sharp contrast with some developed countries' defiance of basic international norms on climate change and their stubborn calls for less-developed countries to undertake bigger international responsibilities incommensurate to their development status.

It is developing countries' stance that all countries should comply with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and use this legally binding document to regulate their activities under the principle of "common but differentiated responsibilities".

Given that there is not much time left for participating countries to discuss and resolve all the thorny issues involved, people should not have too high expectations of the Durban conference. A variety of uncertainties suggest that there is not much possibility of a legally binding treaty being reached that will commit developed countries to undertaking more responsibilities for GHG emissions reduction. The probability is that a non-legally binding document will be signed at the Durban conference, just like the one agreed at the Copenhagen Conference, while leaving all the key issues pending to the next meeting.

Yang Fuqiang in Beijing/China Daily | ANN

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Nov 30, 2011

South Africa - China open to talks on Kyoto extension

Durban, South Africa (China Daily/ANN)- The European Union's conditions before signing a second commitment period of Kyoto Protocol is "not fair" for developing countries, but China is open to negotiation, China's leading climate negotiator, Su Wei, said on Tuesday.

The Kyoto Protocol, effective since 1997, is the only international treaty that sets binding greenhouse gas reduction targets for industrialized countries. And its first commitment period expires next year.

EU has said it will only extend targets under the protocol provided there will be a timetable for negotiating a single legally binding instrument joined by China and US.

"The new conditions are already beyond the mandate agreed in previous talks, namely the Bali Roadmap agreed in 2007," he said.

"I think EU is just shifting the goalpost from one place to another," Su said. "This is actually not an efficient way to do things, because we need to accomplish the goals one by one."

"But since EU is the group of countries who would seriously consider a second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol, developing countries are also open and ready to talk to them about how to address that issue," said Su.

We hope "to secure a really effective and legally binding second commitment period of Kyoto Protocol," he said, calling the international treaty a "cornerstone" for climate talks.

And developing countries may refuse to sell carbon credits generated under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) to those nations who refuse to join a second commitment period of Kyoto Protocol, he added.

"The market mechanism was designed under Kyoto Protocol to help developed countries implement their emission reduction targets in the first commitment period," he said. "So if there is no target, why CDM?"

Li Jing in Durban/China Daily | ANN

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Nov 29, 2011

Philippines - Baguio City most vulnerable to climate change-study

Baguio City in northern Luzon in the Philippines is most vulnerable to climate change of the four cities outside the National Capital Region that were studied by the World Wide Fund for Nature-Philippines.

A Climate Risk Assessment Study made by the WWF and the Bank of the Philippine Islands Foundation Inc. of the cities of Baguio, Cebu, Iloilo, and Davao showed that the northern Luzon metropolis is most vulnerable to extreme weather events.

According to the study, this was due to Baguio City's density and amount of rainfall that it gets every year. Of the four cities surveyed, Baguio City, also known as the country's Summer Capital, is the only that is on the direct path of the typhoons, which usually hit Central and Northern Luzon.

Davao was seen as the least vulnerable among the cities with room for sustainable, integrated area development, the WWF said.

Although Iloilo is rapidly becoming urban and is flood-prone, it has managed to keep its population growth down to 1.53 percent, addressing the population density issue.

Cebu, dubbed the Queen City of the South, remains prominent in manufacturing and trade industries and as such has an opportunity to reinvent itself with investments to "climate-proof" infrastructure and technology to strengthen its current economic supply chains, the WWF study said.

Kristine L. Alave in Manila/Philippine Daily Inquirer | ANN

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South Africa - UN climate talks begin amid worries Kyoto pact may dissolve

UN climate talks have begun amid calls for action to head off worsening drought, floods and storms but also to fears of a bust-up just two years after a near-fiasco in Copenhagen.

Topping the agenda in Durban is the fate of the Kyoto Protocol, the only worldwide pact with targets for curbing heat-trapping emissions, whose first round of pledges expires at the end of 2012.

The conference must also push ahead with a Green Climate Fund to muster up to $100 billion a year for climate-vulnerable countries.

In a speech to the 194-nation forum, South African President Jacob Zuma pointed to a series of disasters in his country as a sign of warning.

"We have experienced unusual and severe flooding in coastal areas in recent times, impacting on people directly as they lose their homes, jobs and livelihoods," he said.

"Given the urgency, governments need to strive to find solutions here in Durban. Change and solutions are always possible, and Durban must take us many steps forward towards a solution that saves tomorrow today."

But the mood has been soured by rifts over how to share out the burden of emissions curbs, while the global economic crisis casts a long shadow over the climate fund.

UN climate chief Christiana Figueres said the 12-day talks must urgently shore up public confidence.

"This conference needs to reassure the vulnerable -- all those who have already suffered and all those who will still suffer from climate change -- that tangible action is being taken for a safer future," she said.

Divisions within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) are pitching rich against poor, rich against rich and poor against poor.

Wealthy countries that are parties to the Kyoto Protocol are baulking at developing-country demands to renew their emissions vows beyond 2012.

Such a move, they argue, would be folly so long as China, which as a developing economy has no specified targets under Kyoto, and the United States, which abandoned the treaty in 2001, are not bound by similar constraints.

"We will not make a second commitment to Kyoto," Canada's environment minister, Peter Kent, said in Ottawa as he called for a "new international agreement" encompassing all major emitters. Canadian broadcaster CTV said Canada would formally withdraw from Kyoto next month.

The European Union is the last bloc in the developed world to champion Kyoto.

It is willing to take on a second round of pledges, but on one condition: all major emitters should endorse the completion of a legally binding global climate pact, perhaps by 2015, into which Kyoto could be subsumed.

The last time a worldwide climate deal was attempted was in Copenhagen, in December 2009, at a summit that notoriously came within an inch of collapse.

In the end, a face-saving deal was brokered among a small group of countries and it has developed into the voluntary matrix which dominates the UNFCCC process today.

Countries register pledges for cutting greenhouse gases in the goal of limiting warming to two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), although the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) says current promises fall far short of what is needed.

But US chief negotiator Jonathan Pershing was cautious about the EU roadmap.

"We want to know more about the content of such an agreement before we commit to a legal form," he said.

He said large emerging economies -- "and, frankly, from what I can tell, Europe as well" -- had no intention to ramp up their pre-2020 promises.

"It is in that context, of course, that we come to a post-2020 agreement."

The 132-nation bloc of developing countries hit at "some" rich countries "which insisted in inflexible positions that would make real progress at this session quite difficult."

But within this bloc are small-island and least-developed countries, who are dismayed by any delay in forging a new treaty.

"It is headed towards a real impasse in Durban, frankly, there is no way to gloss over it," a veteran observer participating in the talks said on Sunday.

AFP

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South Korea - Korea's Climate to Change Faster Than Previously Thought

Korea's climate will change much faster than previously believed, a government report says, and the country will see the same amount of change over the next decade as over the whole of the last century.

Temperatures will rise four times faster than in the last four decades (1971-2010), when the average rise was 1.4 degrees Celsius. Over the next 10 year they will increase by up to 1.5 degrees.

The Korea Meteorological Administration, which led the study in collaboration with eight governmental bodies including the Ministry of Environment, analyzed climate change in Korea based on climate change scenarios released by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change last year.

The report is released Tuesday but the Chosun Ilbo has seen an advance copy. It says Korea's temperature rose 1.8 degrees on average over the last century, but the annual average temperature will be 13.8 degrees by 2020, up 1.5 degrees over the decade, and 15.5 degrees by 2050.

A government official said, "According to the IPCC's earlier prediction, the temperature will increase 2 degrees Celsius on average by 2050. But the new report predicts an increase of 3.2 degrees, up 60 percent from the IPCC's. This means climate change is proceeding much faster than expected."

With glaciers melting as a result of rising temperatures, the sea level in Korea will rise up to 27 cm, 2.8 times as much as previously expected, by 2050.

Annual average rainfall will be 1,378 mm by 2020, up 9 percent from the recent 30-year average of 1,264 mm, and 1,461 mm, up 15.6 percent, by 2050.

Extreme weather such as sweltering heat, tropical nights (when temperatures stay above 25 degrees), and torrential rains, will also likely soar by 2050.

A heat wave across the country last year lasted 8.8 days, but that will increase to 10.3 days by 2020 and 25.1 days by 2050. In Seoul, there were 7.8 tropical nights last year, but in 2020 there will be 11 and by 2050 31.6 days.

englishnews@chosun.com

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Nov 23, 2011

China - Climate change funding 'at risk'

Funding by Western nations to help developing countries fight climate change is more important than ever, even though money may be short due to the financial crisis, China's top climate change official said.

The bleak global economic outlook and various policy positions held by some nations have lowered expectations for climate talks in Durban, South Africa, starting on Monday.

"Western countries are facing difficulties," Xie Zhenhua, vice-minister of the National Development and Reform Commission, said at a news conference on Tuesday.

"Addressing climate change is a long-term project while the world's financial woes are temporary."

The Green Climate Fund is on the agenda for the Durban meeting and hopefully progress can be made on long-term financing, Xie said.

Xie, who will again head the Chinese delegation at the Durban meeting, called for nations to adopt an "active and constructive" attitude.

He Jiankun, a laboratory director who specialises in low-carbon energy at Tsinghua University, stressed the importance of the meeting.

"It will be hard to reach any breakthrough at the Durban meeting, but the meeting is critical as it sets the direction and regime for future international climate change negotiations." Developing countries insist on the double-track negotiation mechanism - the UN Framework of Climate Change Convention and the Kyoto Protocol - while some developed countries want to combine the two. Disputes in Durban over this particular issue could be heated.

China will firmly stick to its commitments on combating climate change despite the global financial turmoil, Xie said.

Durban will also address the fate of the Kyoto Protocol, the only legally-binding treaty to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

China, along with other developing countries, hopes to ensure Kyoto's continuation and there should be no gap between the two commitment periods. The first commitment period is due to expire with Kyoto in 2012.

Xie called on the European Union to continue to "take a leading role" in addressing climate change and said European countries have done an excellent job in combating climate change.

But Zhang Haibin, an associate professor at Peking University, was not optimistic. As Europe is still struggling to find a way out of the eurozone crisis, the structure of international climate negotiations will be severely affected.

"If we look at previous talks, any progress that has been achieved has something to do with EU leadership," he said.

"But with its increasing financial vulnerability the EU is not likely to be really active and assume greater responsibility this time," Zhang said.

The United States did not sign up to Kyoto and it is doubtful if Washington will make any legally-binding commitment now or in the coming years, Zhang said. It is unlikely that Durban will see major progress, he added.

The European Union wants a second commitment period for Kyoto, provided China and the US seek major cuts in the coming years.

Under the principle, rich nations - with their history of industrialization, should substantially cut their greenhouse gases and provide funding and technological support for developing countries to make voluntary reductions in their emissions.

But developed countries have been pushing the leading emerging economies - China, India, Brazil and South Africa - to shoulder more responsibility as their emissions have risen in step with their growing economic clout.

China has become the world's top carbon emitter over the past several years, overtaking the US.

"But we will not let our carbon emissions grow unchecked and repeat the mistakes of rich countries during their industrialization," Xie said.

China hopes to reduce the per-unit GDP greenhouse gas emission in 2020 by 40 to 45 per cent from 2005 levels.

Xie said China is willing to reconsider its role under the UN Framework of Climate Change Convention beyond 2020, based on scientific reviews on global warming to be published in 2015.

"China is willing to shoulder its due obligations consistent with its development stage, but the fundamental principle of 'common and differentiated responsibilities' needs to be upheld," he said.

Climate talks were held in 2009 in the Danish capital, Copenhagen, but little progress was made.

Lan Lan and Li Jing

China Daily

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Nov 22, 2011

Indonesia - More diseases as ozone diminishes

As the ozone layer thins, medical experts have warned people to be aware of sun exposure to avoid health problems such as skin cancer and cataracts.

During the last two decades, the stratosphere has thinned by 3 percent, causing the sun’s exposure to the earth to increase by 12 percent, adding to the prevalence of skin cancer and cataracts.

There are three types of skin cancer: basal cell carcinoma (BCC), which is the most common and curable type, squamous cell carcinoma (SCC), which is also common but can undergo a small metastasis in small percentage of patients, and melanoma maligna, the most rare and dangerous type.

The world has seen an increasing number of skin cancer cases, with the US experiencing a 69 percent increase between 1950 and 2001.

Research conducted in 2004 by the University of Glasgow showed that Europe saw 99 cases of BCC per 100,000 people, 15 cases of SCC per 100,000 and 10 cases of melanoma per 100,000. The World Cancer Day campaign set 2011 as the year to raise awareness of skin cancer.

In Indonesia, the prevalence of skin cancer is still relatively low compared to other types of cancer, such as cervical cancer, lung cancer or breast cancer. According to the 2008 Globocan data, the estimation of skin cancer cases was still under 5,000.

However, instances of skin cancer have been on the increase. Bali-based dermatologist Laksmi Duarsa said that skin cancer cases ranked third in 13 hospitals in 1984. She also found skin cancer cases were in the top three most common health problems in Yogyakarta in 1995.

She said that in Sanglah Hospital, the number of skin cancer cases had been increasing since 2007, with the percentage of melanoma cases having increased from 2 percent in 2007 to 4 percent in 2008.

“To protect the skin from cancer risks, people should avoid doing activity under direct sunlight between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m.,” she said.

“If people must do activity outdoors during this time period, they should take protective measures, such as using umbrellas, wearing hats or using sun screen cream. People who are at risk of skin cancer are those who work outdoors, like fishermen and farmers.”

Besides skin cancer, another disease caused by the thinning ozone layer is cataracts, a clouding of the lens of the eye. An eye survey conducted in Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara showed that 70 percent. Indonesia has the highest prevalence rate of blindness among other Southeast Asia countries, with a 1.5 percent prevalence rate.

Nila Djuwita Moeloek, an ophthalmologist from the University of Indonesia and special envoy on Millenium Development Goals to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, said that if the government could decrease the number of cataract cases or carry out cataract operations, it would reduce the burden of cost to between US$5 and $32.

“If a person becomes visually impaired due to a cataract, he or she cannot work and will need an escort, which has financial implications. If we operate on people with cataracts, not only will these people remain independent, but they will also become productive,” she said.

According to Nila, 410 patients had received radical surgery between 1980 and June 2010. She estimated that there was between 13 and 14 patients receiving radical surgery per year.

Seen as a global threat, countries have committed to reducing the use of substances that potentially deplete the ozone layer, such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and HCFC (hydrochlorofluorocarbons).

As part of the Montreal Protocol, adopted in 2007, signatories committed to quickening the eradication of HCFCs due to the propensity of these substances to deplete the ozone layer and foster global warming. HCFCs, which are commonly used substances, are 2,000 times stronger than carbon dioxide (CO2) in terms of increasing global warming.

A protocol signatory, Indonesia is planning to gradually halt the consumption of HCFCs by reducing the consumption of products containing these substances by 10 percent by 2015.

In December 2007, Indonesia claimed success in halting the consumption of ozone depleting substances such as CFC, methyl bromide, halon, carbon tetrachloride (CTC) and methyl chloroform (also known as trichloroethane/TCA).

Tifa Asrianti

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

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Nov 14, 2011

Vietnam - Sun shines on climate change initiatives

"The focal point of this green development strategy is how to determine the country’s GHG emissions, which is a very important foundation for international community’s commitments"

>> The Climate for Change

A key international community-backed legal framework will help Vietnam effectively respond to climate change.

The draft national strategy on climate change, trumpeted last week by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment’s (MoNRE) Institute of Meteorology, Hydrology and Environment (IMHEN), would receive international community backing and help Vietnam more effectively respond to climate change, said UNDP assistant country director Dao Xuan Lai. “The strategy should have been made long time ago, given Vietnam is considered one of the few nations expected to be the most heavily affected by climate change,” Lai told VIR.

To be valid from 2012 to 2050, the draft strategy has nine strategic tasks underlining an urgent need for modern climate change mitigation and monitoring techniques, forest plantation, ensuring national food security and water resource security, development of new renewables, planning of industrial and urban development, waste management, climate change awareness improvement and international cooperation.

Each strategic task would be specifically assigned to an economic sector which would then design and implement specific programmes on combating climate change, the MoNRE said.

“The strategy is of prime importance in the Vietnamese government’s battle against climate change as it will include long-term orientations and targets for Vietnam to mitigate climate change impacts and create influential information on climate change among the public, businesses and international community,” Lai said.

“This strategy, developed from the government’s National Target Programme on Responding to Climate Change issued in December, 2008, will be a major framework for the government, ministries, sectors and localities to make their own plans on responding to climate change and sustainable development,” Lai said.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung said the Vietnamese government considered climate change “a vital issue” and responding to climate change must closely link with sustainable growth while pursuing a low-carbon economy.

The draft strategy sees Vietnam having a low-carbon economy, which can successfully respond to climate change and play an important role in the region by 2100. It also determines three implementation stages, under which greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions are to be integrated into the nation’s socio-economic development activities, with possible future revisions of the strategy in a manner suitable to the nation’s responses to climate change.

Additionally, the draft also embraces 10 different key climate change-related programmes, such as water resource management, climate change science, GHG emission monitoring, urban areas’ climate change responding, irrigation, and multiplying models to successfully fight climate change.

“But, much remains to be done as this draft strategy still has general information. It must be made in detail,” Lai said.

The UNDP said climate change would be one of the biggest challenges for Vietnam’s socio-economic development, especially people living on agricultural production activities, and for the country to reach its Millennium Development Goals. The MoNRE reported that Vietnam’s average temperature augmented 0.7 Degrees Celsius between 1951-2000. It was expected that the temperature would rise 2-3 degrees Celsius in the 21st century.

Over the past 20 years, Vietnam’s sea level rose 20 centimetres and was expected to be increasing another 30cm over the next 50 years. Also last week, a new scenario on climate change and sea level rises in Vietnam was made public by the IMHEN. This scenario has been updated from the one issued in 2009 with new figures about expected temperature rises and changes in rainfall and humidity in coming decades in different parts of Vietnam.

Notably, if the sea level rose one metre by 2100, some 10.5 per cent of the Red River Delta area would be inundated by sea water, while this rate would be 2.5 per cent in the central coastal region, 20.1 per cent in Ho Chi Minh City and 39 per cent in the Mekong River Delta.

Meanwhile, the rate of population to be directly hit by this disaster in these regions would respectively be 9.4, 8.9, 7 and 34.6 per cent by 2100.

The new scenario also forecast increased temperatures from 1980-1999 to 2100. Specifically, the temperature would rise 2-3 degrees Celsius in winter, 2-2.5 degrees in spring, summer and winter in northern and southern regions respectively, and 3 degrees in the central regions by 2100.

IMHEN vice head Nguyen Van Thang, who is also vice chairman of the National Target Programme on Responding to Climate Change’s office, said this scenario would continue being updated every year, so the government could revise measures to cope with climate change and call for international support.

But he said that under the National Target Programme on Responding to Climate Change, nearly half of ministries and sectors had failed to issue their own action plans for combating climate change during 2010-2015.

“Some governmental authorities are too slow. This will affect the government’s programmes calling for international financial and technical support for responding to climate change. The remaining ministries and sectors will have to complete these plans next year,” Thang said, adding that many tasks needed to be completed in 2012.

These included the national programme on climate change science and technology, minimising climate change’s impacts on the Socio-economic Development Strategy 2011-2020 and the Socio-economic Development Plan 2011-2015. For example, the draft national strategy on green development for 2011-2020 with a vision to 2030 was recently submitted to the National Steering Committee on Climate Change headed by Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai for discussion and approval next year.

“The focal point of this green development strategy is how to determine the country’s GHG emissions, which is a very important foundation for international community’s commitments,” Lai said. Over the past years, international debates have been focused exclusively on trimming down GHG emissions as the best solution to cope with climate change.

According to UNDP, Vietnam’s per capita GHG emission volume remained far lower than that in many developed nations. However, they sharply augmented, from 0.3 tonnes in 1990 to 1.2 tonnes in 2007, when the world’s average per capita GHG emission volume was 4.4 tonnes, the US (20.6 tonnes), Russia (10.6 tonnes), United Kingdom (9.8 tonnes), France (6 tonnes) and China (3.8 tonnes).

Lai said UNDP and other international donors stood ready to help Vietnam perfect its approach in responding to climate change.

Thanh Tung | vir.com.vn

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Nov 12, 2011

Asia - APAC - Water disasters in the region: A clarion call for action

The past 12 months have seen a spate of flood-related disasters in the Asia-Pacific region.

Many parts of eastern Australia, China and Pakistan were under water. Japan was devastated by an earthquake and tsunami, resulting in extensive inundation. Even the Mississippi River basin suffered from one of its worst floods in a century. Several Southeast Asian countries were also ravaged by floods. The most severely affected was Thailand. The deluge swamped the rice bowl and industrial heartland of the country, including Bangkok, making it one of the worst disasters in the country's history.

These calamities have caused enormous losses and difficulties, economically and socially, with ripple effects around the world through supply chain disruptions. The fallout from stalled industrial output and associated loss in employment and income, compounded by reduction in agricultural production, with the probable rise in food prices will likely mean an increase in vulnerability, if not outright poverty. There is now serious concern of a setback to human development, with heightened insecurity and misery.

If the sayings "every cloud has a silver lining" or "in any crisis, there is also an opportunity" are meaningful, then two upcoming gatherings of leaders from the Asia-Pacific region within a span of a week will present a golden opportunity to seriously address the management of water and other disasters via timely and concrete collective action.

The leaders of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec), comprising 21 economies around the Pacific Rim, including seven members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), are meeting in Honolulu this weekend to discuss, among other things, disaster-related challenges. As part of this event, a High-Level Dialogue on Disaster Resilience comprising both government and private-sector leaders will be held with the aim of sharing experiences on public-private partnerships in disaster preparedness.

Apec has a Working Group on Emergency Preparedness to address various disaster issues faced by member economies. It has convened numerous forums and produced a region-wide strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction and Emergency Preparedness and Response for 2009-2015. Interestingly, workshops on topics such as "Public-Private Partnerships and Disaster Resilience", "Facing Abnormal Flood Disaster" and "Private Sector Emergency Preparedness" were held within the past year or so.

In a week's time, the Asean Summit and related summits with dialogue partners will be held in Bali. Leaders from 14 of the 21 Apec economies will be represented, to be joined by the three (non-Apec) Asean members plus India and the UN. Discussions on disaster issues will feature prominently.

Asean has already established a Committee on Disaster Management and has an Agreement on Disaster Management and Emergency Response (AADMER). This is expected to become fully operational with the formal launch of the Asean Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance (AHA) at the Bali summit. The AHA Centre will serve as the coordination hub and focal point for mobilisation of resources to disaster-affected areas in the Asean region.

Asean deployed an Emergency Rapid Assessment Team in response to the flooding in Thailand to identify basic and immediate needs. Indonesia, the current chair of Asean, provided US$3.1 million to six flood-affected countries in Asean, as a goodwill gesture in the spirit of solidarity. Earlier this week, Asean and the World Bank/GFDRR and UNISDR convened an Asean Disaster Risk Financing Forum in Jakarta to help member countries build greater financial resilience to natural disasters.

Since 2005, Asean has conducted annual disaster emergency response simulation exercises, and under its defence cooperation with dialogue partners has also held periodic search-and-rescue and disaster relief exercises. Moreover, Asean, primarily through its Working Group on Water Resources Management, and in cooperation with its external partners, has implemented workshops as well as prepared strategic plans addressing both flood and drought and other water-management issues.

As the countries in the region pursue the aims of minimising water-related disaster risk and putting in place appropriate protection measures, a few thoughts come to mind.

Effective management of any natural resource like water is a function of the physical infrastructure, or hardware, as well as the social institutions/organisational, or software. As is often observed, the latter tends to be more crucial than the former in many instances, and, if not managed well, can actually exacerbate the problem. Integrated water resources management (IWRM) has been advocated for development and utilisation of water resources in a coordinated, equitable and sustainable fashion. Implicitly, IWRM involves an inter-disciplinary, participatory and multi-stakeholder approach.

While the current problem facing the Pacific Rim may be flooding due to the prevailing La Nina climatic phenomenon, which generally brings more rainfall to certain regions, the situation could soon shift to drought conditions during the alternate phase of the climatic occurrence known as El Nino. Adding to the climate variation due to global warming, harder-to-predict events such as extremely wet, dry, hot and cold spells are likely to occur with greater frequency and severity, as reported recently by climate scientists.

Planning for uncertainties is becoming the norm. Putting in place well-thought-out contingency measures and coping mechanisms while also having effective crisis management systems would go a long way to addressing disaster-related challenges. Ensuring sufficient cooperation on these initiatives from all sectors of society would be critical to their success.

In facing the multi-dimensional challenges of today's world in a more proactive way, some paradigm shifts, mindset changes and perhaps alternative approaches may be required. Human beings are, however, generally learning-oriented, and thus the saying, "necessity is the mother of invention", can still provide hope.

With this year's flood incidences around the Pacific Rim, the time is certainly ripe for countries in the region to take more concerted actions on effectively addressing disaster matters in a holistic manner - from prevention and risk reduction to preparedness and response - with the aim of building disaster-resilient and safer communities. The combined knowledge, expertise, resources and goodwill around the region and globally are enormous and ready to be tapped. There should be no reason for not rapidly deploying them when and where needed. All that is required is political will, enlightened leadership, streamlined procedures and, above all, a spirit of common resolve and partnership to put the various plans and strategies that have been drawn up into effective action.

Apichai Sunchindah

Asia News Network

Apichai Sunchindah is a policy advisor of GIZ (German International Cooperation). The views expressed are his own.

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