(Eagle News) — President Rodrigo Duterte on Wednesday, May 9, said the Paris Agreement could turn out to be a “farce.”
“(This) could be a farce if we cannot compel the other nations especially the industrialized nations to follow,” the President said after the presentation of New Generation Coins in Malacanang.
While Duterte welcomed the limits to carbon footprints being imposed in the agreement signed by 194 countries, including those from the European Union and China, he noted that developed countries were “industrialized” as early as the 1800s.
“Tayo, we are on the threshold of economic (development)..we can hardly catch up,” he said.
The agreement aims to limit the increase in global average temperatures to “well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels.”
It also aims to “pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, recognizing that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change.”