The Philippine government should take its cue from former US Vice President Al Gore who tagged the Philippines as one of the world’s most vulnerable countries due to climate change by creating an army of so-called eco-warriors while generating tens of thousands of employment, a House leader said on Saturday.
House deputy majority leader and Davao City Rep. Karlo Alexei Nograles, at the same time, pushed for the signing into law of the proposed Philippine Green Jobs Act of 2016 which has been approved by both chambers of Congress and pending for President Benigno Aquino III’s signature.
Nograles is the principal author of the proposed law at the House of Representatives. The measure seeks to promote work that produce goods and services that benefit and preserve the environment. These particularly involve business enterprises that use fewer natural resources in their production processes.
Nograles said that Gore’s observation on the impact of climate change should be taken very seriously by the government and that the Filipino people, including the leaders and policy makers, we must learn from the hard lessons of past weather-related calamities that destroyed communities and caused the death of many people.
Nograles noted Gore’s claim that at least 13 million Filipinos will have to be relocated due to the rapidly rising sea level as a result of global warming because of the continuing skepticism among policy makers.
“Even here in the Philippines, there’s a lot of skepticism when it comes to the extent of long term effects of climate change. While there is an increasing interest in the use of renewable energy and a growing awareness on the issue of climate change, the Philippines still has a long way to go before our policy makers and our people in general can truly embrace the concept of environmental protection and conservation,” Nograles said.
Nograles stressed the government must step up efforts to ensure that the people becomes more adaptive to the rapidly changing weather conditions and harness people’s support and participation in the global movement to heal Mother Earth.
He said that the Philippine Green Jobs Act can jumpstart the country’s contribution in generating environment warriors who would be in the frontline of the global campaign against climate change.
Nograles said that through the PGJA, the so-called “green companies” or businesses that are involved in the production of environment friendly-products and those that offer services to promote environmental protection and conservation are entitled to fiscal incentives that may include additional deduction of labor expense and duty-free importation of capital equipment.
The PGJA is also pushing for fiscal incentives and tax perks for individuals and enterprises that participate in the creation of green jobs, practice the use of environment-friendly technologies and produce green goods and services.