THERE appears to be a global shift in the thinking about global warming.
From the previous thinking that climate change is inevitable and that nothing can be done about it, there is now a thinking that it is possible to adapt to it on one hand, and to mitigate its effects to some extent.
What is very clear, however, is that global warming and climate change will weaken or destroy our sources of livelihood, thus setting back our efforts towards poverty reduction.
It might have gone unnoticed also, but there also appears to be a shift in the global thinking about poverty, that it is actually possible to reduce it or perhaps to slow down its pervasiveness.
Before that, the dominant thinking was to alleviate it, meaning to simply soften the impact of poverty among the poor people, but not to physically or statistically remove them from the below the poverty line.
It is common knowledge that the Philippines has one of the longest coastlines in the world, but it has apparently not entered into our common sense that our coastal areas will be greatly affected by global warming and climate change on one hand, and therefore the livelihood of the people who live in these areas will also be affected on the other hand, particularly the fishermen and the farmers who live there.
The worst thing that could happen to our coastal areas is the rising of sea levels, a disaster that could destroy everything that is within and around our existing coastal lines, as new coastal lines will be formed farther inland.
A less disastrous scenario is for the fish and other marine life to disappear, as global warming heats up the water. Either that or the waters around the coastal areas will get so polluted to the extent that it could no longer support any life form.
Sounding like a play of words, climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction could actually mean the same thing, or perhaps it could also be interchangeable to some extent. Add to that the concept of mitigation, which is very similar to adaptation, except that its focus is to soften the impact of natural disasters. Mitigation would be similar to alleviation, but it is not reduction.
It is unfortunate to note that up to now, there are many government officials who still do not know the difference between poverty alleviation and poverty reduction. That is very worrisome, because if they could not fathom the difference between these two, they may not be able to understand the difference between climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction, or even mitigation for that matter. This is not simply a matter of semantics, because not understanding the difference between these two could mean the life or death of many people.
It is good to note that the government has created a Climate Change Commission (CCC) that is different from the already existing National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC). Presumably, the CCC is the one on top of climate change adaptation, while the MDRRMC is the one on top of disaster risk reduction. Hoping that that is the case, I am hoping that these two agencies are coordinating very closely with each other, because they are both dealing with the two sides of the same supply chain.
It is also good to note that the government renamed the old National Disaster Coordinating Council (NDCC) into what is the NDRRMC. What comes with this renaming is the apparent realization that disasters could not be coordinated, as the old name suggested.
Kidding aside, the new focus now is no longer the coordination of disasters, but the management of the entire disaster risk management process, as the new name suggests.
Again, it is also good to note that the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) is looking into the production of hydro power, since they are already in charge of water resources that could generate electricity.
It is a good move on their part to go beyond their normal functions to serve a national need. How I wish that the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) would go also beyond their normal functions to help the fishermen in the coastal areas, even if they could easily point their fingers to the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR).
Correct me if I am wrong, but there seems to be no government agency right now that is specifically dedicated to poverty reduction, even if many government agencies would claim that they are doing something about poverty alleviation.
Come to think of it, the government does not seem to have clear poverty reduction targets, either at the national or the local level. It does not seem to have clear job creation targets either, even if we all know that job creation is one clear way towards poverty reduction.
On the upside, the government does have a way of measuring the poverty rate, and that is why it is able to monitor whether poverty has been reduced or has increased. On the downside, the government has apparently not yet adopted the relatively recent multidimensional poverty index (MPI) of the United Nations, a new measure that focuses more on the quality of life, rather than the ability to afford the imaginary basket of goods./PN
