Greta Thunberg gets behind attacks on Filipinos activists - Climate Weekly
Welcome to Climate Weekly!
Each week we’ll ask one guest writer from our network to give you a short selection of some of the best climate news from their region, giving you a little window into some climate stories you probably didn’t see in your News Feed.
This week, we’re back in Asia, where Pats Olivia is here to share the latest on the Philippines, and Duterte’s looming Empire
Hello everyone!
I am Pats, a climate and health communicator from Manila, Philippines working with hospitals and frontline communities in achieving sustainable healthcare and environmental justice.
As the lockdown drags in the Philippines, air pollution is back again, as fossil fuel industries return to business-as-usual, with state-sponsored armed forces as their murderous protection.
The biggest news in the last few weeks is that the government has shut down the country’s largest TV network, ABS-CBN, and introduced a new Anti-Terrorism Act, which many here believe is aimed at targeting environmental protestors and inspired 2 beautiful protests in the last few weeks.
In the act, “terrorism” has a very broad definition, giving the Duterte administration full power to arrest without warrant and conduct surveillance on those who write critical op-eds, or get involved in relief drives. Even Greta Thunberg got behind the #JunkTerrorLaw campaign.
ABS-CBN meanwhile has been one of the leading platforms critical of Duterte’s environmental and Human Rights record. Hanah Fernandez of Eco-Business wrote about why this was a critical loss for the environmental movement in the Philippines.
You may have also heard about the oil spill just outside Iloilo city. Last week in central Philippines, the Ayala-owned AC Energy power barge ruptured, leaking over 200,000 liters of oil across the coast. This has forced more than 300 local residents to flee and risks contaminating the island’s rich and diverse marine ecology.
In another incident, closer to Manila, more than 3,000 fisher folks, farmers and their families are being forced out of their homes to give way to an SMC Global Power-sponsored 600-megawatt coal-fired power plant which was listed as “urgent” by the province’s Governor back in November 2019. This is despite the threat of the coronavirus and a strong opposition from residents which started way back 2017.
There is a lot of conjecture about the amount of coal that might be on the horizon. The Department of Energy is planning to triple the current amount of coal in the country, but recent divestment shifts by one of the country’s largest energy producers, and speculation about international financing options could signal that this goal may not be achieved.
However, there have been some positive moves this week to support Green recovery packages for local governments across the Philippines, including a proposal for local districts to “say No to Coal”.
The journey towards some sort of recovery, let alone a Green recovery looks long and difficult for my country.
A lot of people talk about how mobile phones allowed African countries to leapfrog the West, this week Diana Karakire wrote about how electric Buses in Kampala could do the same for Uganda’s public transport.
What else we’re reading
2 interesting Nature papers on heatwaves. Both are open access. This one on Britain’s future as a heatwave capital, and then this one on the regional differences in heatwaves globally.
A new study from the University of Sydney is billing itself as “The first comprehensive study of the pandemic” and its environmental impacts. Notably, it argues that COVID-19 has had a bigger environmental benefit than the UN climate talks have ever achieved; “none of the attempts by any government or any international agreement in the 32-year history of intergovernmental climate policy has had such a dramatic mitigation effect.”
Photo of the Week
Incase you’re wondering what those protests looked like? Check out this dinosaur
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