Taiwan asks PH support in bid to join climate change conference

Dear Editor,

I am writing to you regarding the Philippines’ support for Taiwan’s participation in upcoming 24^th Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP24) to be held on 2-14 December 2018, in Katowice, Poland.

At the conference, the participants are expected to work out and adopt a package of decisions to better ensure the full implementation of the Paris Agreement. This will help focus international efforts on mitigating and adapting to the impact of climate change.

However, due to political pressure, Taiwan can only attend the COP sessions as an NGO observer.

As a result, when the world meets in Poland in December, the people of Taiwan will have no voice in those talks. This is not right. The people of Taiwan should be treated equally to make a substantial contribution to the protection of Mother Earth.

Taiwan’s absence from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) undermines this simple fact and weakens the world’s ability to act as one. It is unjust to keep Taiwan excluded from the UNFCCC and leave Taiwan to deal with the impact of climate change on its own.

Despite Taiwan’s exclusion from the efforts to fight climate change, Taiwan will continue its unwavering efforts with unshakable determination to combat climate change for the sake of Taiwan and the international community.

In June 2015, Taiwan passed the Greenhouse Gas Reduction and Management Act, setting five-year regulatory carbon reduction targets in the hope of reducing Taiwan’s greenhouse gas emissions to 50 percent of 2005 levels by 2050. It seeks to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by two percent by 2020, 10 percent by 2025, and 20 percent by 2030.

In August 2018, Taiwan amended its Air Pollution Control Act to reduce air pollution and accelerate Taiwan’s energy transformation. It also seeks to further restrict vehicle and factory emissions, improve air quality, and enhance the management of pollution sources and treatment of pollution.

As the issue of global mercury prevention becomes an impending issue, Taiwan has turned over the mercury deposition sampler, handed by the Taiwan EPA to the Philippines’ DENR. The equipment is designed to systematically monitor wet deposition and atmospheric contractions of mercury and to tackle the transnational mercury pollution.

Climate change concerns all humans. The climate change issue is a humanitarian issue as well as a global issue that knows no borders. Climate change requires not just national, but global solutions. It requires cross-border cooperation.

I call on all like-minded countries to look beyond political considerations and support Taiwan’s professional, pragmatic, and constructive participation in the UNFCCC.

Global challenge requires global response. For the sake of Mother Earth, I urge the Philippine Government and its people to support Taiwan’s participation in the upcoming COP24 in Poland. Let Taiwan and the Philippines work together in global efforts to combat climate change!

Michael Peiyung Hsu

Representative

Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in the Philippines