Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Maria Antonia Yulo-Loyzaga on Friday identified strategies of the government to mitigate the effects of climate change.

According to Loyzaga, the DENR has three measures to address climate change concerns.

“The first is we have of course our Greenhouse Gas Inventory which is currently being updated,” Loyzaga said during an interview on Malacanang Insider.

The second is the Nationally Determined Contribution Implementation Plan (NDCIP).

“That’s basically a plan that involves a framework and the database approach towards reducing our emission by sector. In the NDC implementation plan or the NDCIP, we take stock of which sectors are actually causing our emission to happen,” she said.

Loyzaga said the government is focused on the energy sector, transport and fuels. It also centered on the emissions from the agriculture sector, industries and solid waste.

“So, in terms of strategy to bring down those emissions or what we call climate mitigation, we actually need to address the way we use fuels, the way we actually plant rice because a lot of that methane comes from the way we use wet and dry rice growing and the way we manage solid waste, because methane comes from that as well,” Loyzaga said.

At the end of the day, the industry, its consumption of energy, and its use of materials would be part of the principal contributors, she said.

“So, NDCIP actually provides us with a framework and an estimate of what it would cause for us to actually move towards a low carbon future,” she pointed out.

The third is the National Adaptation Plan (NAP).

This document looks at several hazards related to climate, and how it is enhanced or affected by climate change.

“It looks at sea level rise. It looks at intense rainfall. It looks at intense winds for example. It looks at tropical cyclones and its impact on different sectors,” Loyzaga said.

She added the NAP identifies the measures of the government to invest in natural and structural solutions or social programs, and to become more resilient to the impacts of climate change.

“Taken together, these are a combination of strategies that we need to put forward in terms of interjecting in all the different mandates of the different governments, a climate resilience approach,” Loyzaga said.

“That’s actually happening now because we are climate tagging our investments now and we’re also working on the Program Convergence Budget,” she added. Presidential News Desk