Thammasat University students interested in ASEAN studies, urban studies, climate change, history, political science, international affairs, economics, and related subjects may find it useful to participate in a free 6 March Zoom webinar, Cities and Climate Challenges in Southeast Asia.

The event, on Monday, 6 March 2023 at 2pm Bangkok time, is presented by ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore.

The TU Library collection includes several books about different aspects of climate change in the ASEAN community.

The event webpage explains:

About the Webinar

Concerns over climate risks and vulnerabilities have been gaining ground in many Southeast Asian cities as the region continues to experience greater and more intense climate impacts. Policymakers and communities have increasingly factored climate risk consideration in their urban planning policies. Yet, Southeast Asian cities, with their diverse development trajectories, local capacities, and their growth aspirations, face unique challenges in addressing the climate crisis.

Against this backdrop, the Climate Change in Southeast Asia Programme at the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute organised a workshop for policymakers, practitioners, and scholars in October 2021 to discuss the interconnected challenges of climate risks and urban development and how cities in the region advancing their climate mitigation and adaptive capacities. The workshop has resulted in the publication of a compendium Cities and Climate Challenges in Southeast Asia which sheds light on varied and contextual experiences of Southeast Asian urban communities in addressing climate challenges and scenarios for future policy making.

This webinar will bring three contributors of the compendium to share their respective research projects in addressing the problem of water insecurity in the City of Baguio, Philippines; understanding the City of Jakarta’s collaborative experience with international city climate networks; and the role of Official Development Assistance (ODA) in promoting climate adaptation tools by drawing from the experience of Japanese ODA in Vietnamese cities.

Students are invited to register at this link:

https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_tYyyuYXGTqqae88ESeIZjg

The speakers will include Professor Peter Andreas Gotsch, who teaches Sustainable Urban Development in the Global South in the Urban Ecological Planning Program at the Department of Architecture and Planning, Norwegian University of Science and Technology; Professor Alejandro N. Ciencia, who teaches Political Science at the Department of Economics and Political Science, College of Social Sciences, University of the Philippines Baguio; Ms Nila Kamil of the Indonesian Ministry of Environment and Forestry, Directorate General of Climate Change Control; and Associate Professor Michiyo Kakegawa of the Faculty of Economics, Soka University, Japan.

Also participating will be Ms Sharon Seah, Senior Fellow and the Coordinator of ASEAN Studies Centre (ASC) and Climate Change in Southeast Asia Programme (CCSEAP), ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore.

In 2021, an article was posted on the website of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a bipartisan, nonprofit policy research organization.

The article, Security Challenges of Climate Change in Southeast Asia, noted:

Southeast Asia will be one of the world’s most vulnerable regions to climate change unless countries make dramatic cuts in greenhouse gas pollution. According to a 2018 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a global warming increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.4 degrees Fahrenheit) will cause rising seas, dangerous flooding, and changing rain patterns leading to violent typhoons and drought. Global warming poses a threat to food security, hobbles economic growth, prompts political instability, and catalyzes pandemics. In extreme cases, it can create an environment conducive to terrorist activities. […]

Southeast Asia’s massive coastal populations in archipelagic countries like the Philippines and Indonesia are at immediate risk from sea level rises and extreme weather events, particularly those working in agriculture and fishing. Sea level rises threaten to inundate large swaths of the region’s coast and are expected to displace millions of people. Even if the world manages to keep average global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees, sea level rises will still inundate huge swaths of farmland and submerge densely populated cities, forcing millions to flee their homes.

The Philippines lies in the planet’s most cyclone-prone region, with an increasing number of deadly storms making landfall each year. Much of the coral around the Philippine islands will die due to rising temperatures and acidification, threatening to cut fish stocks in half in the next few decades. An expected shorter rainy season in Indonesia will have a harmful impact on agriculture, which employs about half of the country’s population. Roughly half of the capital of Jakarta is already below sea level, some areas are sinking rapidly, and increasing parts of the city will be inundated in the decades ahead. As one of the world’s largest rice exporters, Thailand’s crops and the livelihoods of nearly half its population are threatened by as little as one degree of warming. Without scientific breakthroughs, rice yields in the economies of Southeast Asia could drop as much as 50 percent by 2100.

All the countries of Southeast Asia signed the Paris Climate Agreement, but most have few strategies to prevent the most severe climate hazards. Energy demand continues to grow, and coal alone accounts for nearly 40 percent of the increased energy needs in the region. The use of coal is growing and is driven partly by its relative abundance and low cost compared to oil, gas, and renewables. Deforestation makes it difficult for countries to capture greenhouse gases before they enter the atmosphere and warm the planet. In Indonesia, home to some of the world’s largest forests, deforestation accounts for almost half of the country’s increasing emissions.

Despite the dire forecast for how climate change will hurt Southeast Asia over the next few decades, the situation is not all doom and gloom. Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s largest economy and the world’s fourth-largest carbon emitter, is making efforts to rein in deforestation and stepping up its manufacture of batteries and electric vehicles. Thailand and Vietnam are turning increasingly to renewable energy sources to reduce the Thai dependence on Mekong dams and Vietnam’s coal-fired plants.

But the plans of most countries in the region focus on climate change reduction while simultaneously promoting energy development for economic growth using coal. Because of the complex nature and extent of climate change effects in Southeast Asia, projects to adapt to and resist climate change will need to rely on global climate change funds, international lending institutions, and foreign governments.

(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)