Philippines left out of Canada’s climate change aid
rbarnes
Posted On novembre 26, 2013
By CHRIS PLECASH |
Published: Monday, 11/25/2013 12:00 am EST
The federal government provided $1.2-billion to help developing countries combat climate change between 2010 and 2013, but typhoon-battered Philippines didn’t see a cent of it.
The Philippines was among more than 100 developing countries to receive funding through the UN’s fast-track climate financing program since 2010, but none of it came from Canada. Canadian climate financing went towards adaptation and mitigation projects in more than 60 countries, including emerging economic powerhouses like China, India, and Brazil.
Climate change adaptation has become an important response to increasingly severe weather events like the recent Typhoon Haiyan. The storm cut across the central Philippines on Nov. 7 at speeds of up 300 km an hour, and has left more than a million people homeless and more than 5,000 dead in the Pacific island nation.
The Philippines is particularly susceptible to the rising sea levels and increasingly extreme tropical storms that are associated with climate change. The country is made up of more than 7,000 islands and nearly 100 million residents, many of whom live in substandard housing that can’t sustain the impact of severe storms and flooding. According to the UN Development Program, nearly 28 per cent of Filipinos live below the poverty line.
