By Hollie Younger / Staff writer, with CNA
Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in the Philippines Deputy Director-General Lee Ting-sheng (李廷盛) today attended a forum in Manila on the impact of climate change on regional security.
The forum hosted by the Philippine think tank Stratbase Institute was titled: “Towards a Peaceful and Sustainable Future: Addressing the Climate Conflict Nexus in Asean.”
Lee reaffirmed Taiwan’s willingness to deepen partnerships in climate change action and disaster prevention and response with the Philippines, Japan and other partners along the First Island Chain.
Photo courtesy of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in the Philippines via CNA
Stratbase hosted the forum in cooperation with the German embassy in the Philippines, with Philippine government representatives, international diplomats and climate change experts in attendance.
Lee told Philippine officials that their two countries share the imminent threat of extreme weather events.
In the past month, the Philippines has experienced three consecutive weeks of heavy rain, while southern Taiwan is also suffering from flooding this week brought by southwesterly winds, he said.
Taipei and Manila have been long-standing partners in the fields of meteorology and disaster prevention, with future cooperation to focus on three key areas: real-time sharing of meteorological warnings, sharing smart governance technologies and strengthening regional resilience mechanisms, Lee said.
Taiwan helped the Philippines to establish an upper-air meteorological station in the 2000s, which was followed by more than 10 automatic weather observation stations and a data monitoring center to forecast typhoon activity, he said.
Since 2016, the two countries have also conducted research under the Volcano, Ocean, Typhoon, Earthquake Technical Working Group, he added.