BY: JENNIFER C. TILOS
DUMAGUETE CITY, Negros Oriental, June 18 (PIA) -- If US President Barack Obama funds almost $1billion in the campaign to win the combat on climate change, an officer of the communications group of the Aquino administration believes that extreme weather condition is best cope through the Bayanihan spirit, a Filipino tradition displaying the spirit of unity and cooperation.
Usec Jose Mari Oquiñena of the Presidential Communication Operations Office (PCOO) concurrently Director General of the Philippine Information Agency (PIA) and also serves as executive director of the Gawad Kalinga Community Development Foundation believed winning the campaign on climate change calls for a collective effort saying “ a collective wrong can only be corrected by doing a collective right”.
Oquiñena said the campaign does not all depend on money but by sharing of resources and being united in the movement against climate change.
“We must make this movement our life’s mission,” Oquiñena said to information and tourism officers who attended the 21st RADIO-7(Regional Association Development Information Officers) consultative conference in Cebu, as he called on them to share information that will lead to inspire the public.
The RADIO-7 convention banners the theme “Relevant Information: A Tool for Sustainable Development in Tourism, Environment and Disaster Preparedness,” where more than 100 public information officers and tourism officers in Central Visayas attended in Cebu City recently.
Oquiñena has seen how the Bayanihan spirit successfully worked for the Gawad Kalinga movement, where he is fully involved in alleviating poverty and providing of homes to thousands of homeless families in the Philippines and abroad through the power of unity and cooperation.
Philippines is considered to be one of the countries is that vulnerable of the effects of climate change of which Negros Oriental suffered much during typhoon Sendong landed on December 17, 2011
.
It may be recalled, the strength of typhoon Sendong affected more than 3,000 families and left over 30 reportedly dead.
The tropical storm then also caused damaged to properties, infrastructures, irrigation canals, farms and agricultural crops which cost over P730 million.
With the series of advocacy campaigns, it is said it may convince communities to adapt and mitigate the effects of climate change and insulate communities from the impacts of weather changes and patterns. (mbcn/JCT/PIA7-Negros Oriental with reports from Des A. Tilos/PIO-Valencia)