President Rodrigo Duterte’s recent pronouncement that he would not honor the Paris Accords recalls Deng Xiao Ping’s Growth First Policy, first enunciated in 1978, which propelled China into the industrial superpower that it is today.
By deciding openly to defy the promise to reduce the Philippines’ carbon footprint by 70 percent in 14 years (or by 2030), the president has, in no uncertain terms, set the tone for the country’s rapid development, even if it sets a toll on the environment.
But before we condemn him, let us look at certain facts before us. For example, how much really is the carbon footprint of the Philippines compared to, say, superpowers like China and the United States? And how much does every person in this country contribute to greenhouse gases and carbon dioxide emissions?
Data from the World Resources Institute show that the country does not have such a large carbon footprint at all. As of 2013, we only contribute 0.3 percent to polluting the planet, or something like 148 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions, compared to the United States, which accounts for 15.6 percent (or 6,668.70 million metric tons) or China with 22.7 percent (9,679.30 million metric tons). Even our neighbors Malaysia and Indonesia emit more greenhouse gases than us. The European Union, where Paris, the capital of France, is located is a huge greenhouse gas emitter at 8.7 percent (or 3,733 million metric tons). France itself accounts for 1.2 percent of greenhouse gas emissions.
So what gives? Why did that ambassador (most probably French) remind Duterte to stick to the country’s promise in Paris?
The answer is simple. Because the Philippines is at the suffering end of the 200 years of polluting the planet by the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Germany and all these countries that now sell us their cars and all kinds of industrial products. Climate change impacts us more than many other countries.
It is against this backdrop that one should assess Duterte’s outburst, including the possible expletive, “How dare you demand from us!”
Therein also lies the dilemma of national development that I think should be debated fully in this country.
Will the Philippines ever reach the status of highly developed country without going into industrialization and the concomitant pollution that always goes with it?
Consider China today as it went though its real Great Leap Forward, not under Mao Zedong but under Deng Xiao Ping. In just twenty years, China went from a country of moribund agricultural cooperatives and communes into highly successful town and village industrial enterprises or TVE’s that indeed made the country super rich. At the same time, however, China’s cancer cases increased and Beijing’s near-incessant summer smog has made selling pure air in bottles a booming business.
Ever the maverick that he is, President Duterte is openly addressing the issue of whether we must continue on the path of sending our best people abroad calling them heroes for the untold suffering they do just to bring home the bacon while here at home, we rely on call centers to employ our youths. Or that we should take the path shown by industrialization and all the environmental degradation it entails.
We have enough economists, entrepreneurs, scientists and inventors to carry out national industrialization and the vision of a country manufacturing its own cars, computers, mobile phones and appliances and not depend on other countries for these. But there will be costs to the environment.
Perhaps, like Singapore, we can make our own model of development. Perhaps we can find a unique solution to move this country to ever-greater economic prosperity for all while taking care of the environment. I urge environmentalists out there to come up with such models, one that will be culturally suited to a people so known for ningas cogon, crab mentality and the bane of all, personal aggrandizement (read: corruption).
Otherwise, we can look to China, get rich quick, and die younger than before due to cancer and toxic greenhouse gases.
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