Report - Social Watch Philippines

In the world’s tropical regions, Asia and the Pacifi c
show the highest rate of deforestation, the fastest rate of
commercial logging and the highest rate of fuel wood
removal. The major causes of forest cover loss are attributed
to the expansion of farming, large economic
development programs involving resettlement, agriculture,
and infrastructure. Add to this overharvesting for
industrial use and fuel wood, pollution and extreme
climate events like storms.
Asia and the Pacifi c has been losing its water resources
fast due to ever rising demands of its growing
population, agriculture, industry, and homes. Water for
irrigation accounts for the largest withdrawal from both
surface and ground water sources. Excessive abstraction
of groundwater has been depleting aquifers, lowering
water tables, and inducing sea water and salt intrusion.
Degradation through pollution of river systems, lakes,
wetlands and marshes have aggravated over extraction.
The coastal and marine environments of Asia and
the Pacifi c are being stressed by ever growing demands
for fi sh and marine resources, for expansion of industry,
tourism and human settlements. Open access to these
supposedly common property resources is rapidly
transforming the region’s coasts and seas into a classic
tragedy of the commons.
Asia and the Pacifi c is losing its biodiversity fast.
Though the region is still the home of seven of the
18 mega-diversity nations (Australia, China, India,
Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Papua New
Guinea) its plant and animal species are being destroyed
at a rate that threatens extinction. The obvious causes
are clear cutting of forests and mangroves, diminishing
agro-biodiversity, destruction of corals, and over-fi shing.
Not as obvious are the impacts of biotechnology,
genetic modifi cation and mono-culture.
Conclusion
The chances of our country achieving its MDG
commitments by 2015 are high, mainly because we
are favored by a stable political environment. The new
regime has come to power in a smooth transition and
enjoys a high level of trust across the whole nation.
Very few regimes had such fortune. In contrast, its immediate
predecessor was born of turbulence, governed
in turbulence, and left with many outstanding issues
demanding urgent closure.
But our advantage in political stability stands on
vulnerable grounds. The problems left behind by the
previous PGMA regime are many and the solutions
14 SOCIAL WATCH PHILIPPINES
not easy. There are more poor Filipinos now than
when we started on the MDGs. The damage caused
by natural disasters in 2009 threw us back to a baseline
of reconstruction.
The country is so vulnerable to the impacts of
climate change and variability. Our adaptive capacity is
at a low level, considering the poverty situation and our
country’s geography. The resilience of our communities
and our natural environments has yet to be tested
against the worst-case climate change scenarios.
We are also confronted with increasing uncertainties
within the Asian region and worldwide. China is
the leading success story of the MDGs without which
there would be little or no reduction at all in global
poverty. There is much to learn about how it achieved
a high level of prosperity with universal social protection.
However, the China model is not only hard to
replicate, its claim to success has come about at great
costs to the environment.
Not everything is lost despite our failure to bring the
MDG progress up to a high probability level of achievement
with only fi ve years remaining. It simply means that
the new regime has a lot of catching up to do.
The MDGs is not an impossible dream, just a set
of minimum goals.
References
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