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Date Posted: 22:20:40 09/08/08 Mon
Author: mel manalo
Subject: Online petition for the Philippine Reproductive Health Bill

Good day,

First of all please accept my apology for this unsolicited mail. I am Filipino living back in the Philippines. I had happened to come across the online petition campaign being undertaken by the Reproductive Health Advocacy Network (RHAN) in the country. RHAN is trying to gather signatures to petition Philippine Congress to legislate the Reproductive Health Bill. If you know about and support the goals of the bill but have not read nor signed the online petition yet and would just like to, you can go to this link:

http://www.petitiononline.com/rhan2008/petition.html

I am not directly connected with RHAN but just a concerned citizen trying to help them. Right now I have been trying to get in touch with as many Pinoy communities including those abroad who are still citizens and have direct connections or interest with the politico-social events in the country.

What i am most personally concerned about this issue is the potentially compounding impact of the worsening effects of climate change. The Ateneo School of Government in Manila had just put online a paper from a recently held professorial lecture where the potential impacts of this phenomenon were detailed and reading it I realize the serious implications this has on our country specially when our population is (according to experts) set to double in the next several decades.

Studies which really got my attention include projections of PAGASA (Philippine weather authority) on sea level rise if it were to go around 1 meter will displace 2 million people in Manila alone, and this is using current population figures. Climate experts also expects that a combination of droughts and floods will hit respective parts of the country that could severely affect agriculture. Even our marine food supply can be affected as scientists have found out that rising sea temperatures can slowly kill off coral reef ecosystems upon which the fish that the millions of our fishermen depend upon. Just imagine the economic and social impacts that could befall our kababayans when this happens.

If you are interested here are the links to the powerpoint presentation and the paper itself:

http://www.observatory.ph/SCJ_doc.pdf

http://www.observatory.ph/SCJ_ppt.pdf

Regarding the climate effects mentioned above, the Philippines as a nation would most likely have little impact as of the moment to slow down or even reverse these since measures that are being implemented or formulated by the international community will take decades at the least to generate the desired changes. For the meantime, the country would remain amongst the most vulnerable. But on decelerating our population growth I believe is more within our power to change and would directly and greatly lessen these population vulnerabilities. But sadly measures to do so are not being implemented fast enough, the Reproductive Health Bill envisions to do this and should be enacted as soon as possible. But as most everyone knows and as you have written yourself, there are certain sectors in Philippine society who strongly lobbies against the bill. The bill badly needs its own lobby support and thus I am trying to contribute my own little effort.

I believe there are also a lot of Filipino citizens living abroad who are supportive of this agenda but may not be aware of the petition campaign and so the reason for this mail is my asking for your kind assistance in passing along the links above to those you may know about through your contacts and networks among your families, friends and colleagues and/or get them to post the same on their respective online sites.


Thank you very much and more power,


Mel

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