Jauhn Etienne Villaruel

Residents wade through knee-deep mud in Kasiglahan Village, Barangay San Jose, Rodriguez town, Rizal a week after Typhoon Ulysses struck, November 19, 2020. Shortly after Super Typhoon Rolly devastated the Bicol Region, Typhoon Ulysses dumped 356mm amount of rainfall as recorded from the PAGASA Tanay station which caused massive flooding in Marikina, San Mateo, and Rodriguez Rizal. George Calvelo, ABS-CBN News/File

Article (news)

Flood

Raphael Bosano

ABS-CBN News

<div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:960px;display:block" width="960"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/176369581566720201119-ulysses-aftermath-kasiglahan-village-rizal-GC-5475.jpg" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/><span class="fr-inner" style="text-align:left">Residents wade through knee-deep mud in Kasiglahan Village, Barangay San Jose, Rodriguez town, Rizal a week after Typhoon Ulysses struck, November 19, 2020. Shortly after Super Typhoon Rolly devastated the Bicol Region, Typhoon Ulysses dumped 356mm amount of rainfall as recorded from the PAGASA Tanay station which caused massive flooding in Marikina, San Mateo, and Rodriguez Rizal. George Calvelo, ABS-CBN News/File</span></span></span></div><div><br/></div><p>BELÉM, Brazil — It’s the final stretch of the UN climate change summit in Brazil. As negotiations wind down, countries are scrambling to agree on the next steps to protect their people and the planet from the increasing impacts of a rapidly warming world.</p><p>Speaking to the media on Thursday morning (Brazil time), UN Secretary-General António Guterres appealed to governments to “show willingness and flexibility” in securing outcomes that safeguard communities and keep the 1.5°C goal of the Paris Agreement within reach.</p><p>Like many climate-vulnerable nations and civil society groups, Guterres is pushing for a fair outcome—one that ensures adequate adaptation funding, meaningful emissions cuts, and dependable climate finance.</p><p>“For millions, adaptation is not an abstract goal,” he said.</p><p>“It is the difference between rebuilding and being swept away; between replanting and starving; between staying on ancestral land or losing it forever.”</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>LOSS AND DAMAGE: MORE THAN CLIMATE IMPACTS</strong></div><div><br/></div><p>Just hours before Guterres’ press briefing, Kalea Aquino—a young Indigenous Kankanaey woman—addressed the same room, though with a much smaller audience consisting of only three journalists. Her statement was a gut-wrenching account of Super Typhoon Uwan (Fung-wong), which ravaged parts of the Philippines while she was thousands of miles away at the conference, fighting for her people’s future.</p><p>“Instead of feeling empowered, I felt a deep guilt. I felt helpless watching videos of flooded communities and broken bridges, knowing that there is still no functioning financial mechanism available to deliver the justice and reparations our peoples deserve.” Aquino said.</p><p>While she participates in negotiations inside climate-controlled meeting rooms, her elders back home are forced to flee with nothing but the clothes on their backs. For her, this is not a failure of nature, but a failure of political will.</p><p>For Aquino and other communities in the frontlines of extreme weather, loss and damage is painfully real. It extends far beyond what financial compensation can restore. Typhoons have displaced millions of Filipinos, inflicted trauma, and made recovery rather slow.</p><p>“It is the burial of ancestral houses under mud. It is the erasure of livelihoods built through generations. It is the disappearance of sacred places that hold our people’s memory,” she said.</p><p>“These losses cannot be adapted to. They cannot be reversed. And they cannot be borne by Indigenous Peoples alone.”</p><p>Her plea is for countries to ensure that the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage becomes more than a symbolic gesture, but to make it accessible, efficient, and reach indigenous communities.</p><p>Amounting to only an initial of $250 million and grants ranging between $5 to $20 million for approved proposals, the fund is far from sufficient for many of climate-vulnerable countries. </p><p>Guterres himself described it as “still largely empty.”</p><p>He echoed Aquino’s call, insisting that the fund must be capitalized and easier to access.</p><p>“I urge all funders—bilateral partners, climate funds, and multilateral development banks—to step up and prevent further tragedies,” he said.</p><p>“It is about survival. It is about justice. And for Indigenous Peoples, it is also about protecting cultures and homelands that sustain our planet’s vital ecosystems.”</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>EMISSION CUTS STILL &#x27;NOWHERE NEAR ENOUGH&#x27;</strong></div><div><strong></strong><strong><br/></strong></div><p>Fossil fuel dependence, especially among developed countries, remains the core driver of the crisis that brought the world to Brazil. Decades of scientific data point to greenhouse gas emissions as the main force behind rising temperatures and worsening climate extremes.</p><p>Yet even with the commitments made since the Paris Agreement was adopted a decade ago, Guterres breaks the bad news: it is nowhere near enough.</p><p>“We must move much faster with a drastic cut in emissions. With the right support, it is essential that most countries peak emissions now, slash them in half this decade, hit net-zero by 2050, and go net-negative after.”</p><p>Jameela Joy Reyes of the Loss and Damage Collaboration and the Manila Observatory shares the same concern. With the Philippines experiencing repeated cycles of destruction and loss, she joined the chorus of voices urging immediate and decisive action.</p><p>“I urge all parties at COP30 to demand that high-emitting countries and fossil fuel corporations be held accountable through contributions to the loss and damage fund and through other financial mechanisms,” she said.</p><p>Throughout the two-week summit, side events repeatedly emphasized the urgent need to phase out fossil fuels and pursue a just transition, defined by the International Labour Organization as an equitable shift toward a greener economy that creates decent work and leaves no one behind.</p><p>Guterres welcomed these conversations.</p><p>“I urge countries to ensure that the Belém outcome operationalizes a just transition that is aligned with a 1.5-degree world,” he said.</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>NEGOTIATING FOR A LIVABLE FUTURE</strong></div><div><br/></div><p>While press conferences amplify the hopes and demands of stakeholders, the real battle is actually behind closed doors where ministers and negotiators debate over text, commas, and commitments that will shape the world’s future as far as climate is concerned.</p><p>For the Philippine delegation, how any country fares in responding to climate change is balancing act between advancing climate policy and protecting national priorities. Vicente Paolo Yu, who sits in the Loss and Damage and Global Stocktake discussions, says the Philippines must both learn from others and share its own experiences.</p><p>“Maybe we can learn from Cuba, because their emergency and disaster preparedness before hurricanes is considered world-class. But at the same time, I think other countries can learn from us in terms of community resilience,” Yu said.</p><p>“No one country has a monopoly on best practice. We all have to learn from each other.”</p><p>Thirty years into the climate talks, no one expected the path to be simple. And as Guterres reminded delegates that no country will leave the Amazonian city of Belém with everything it wants. This reality makes it even more crucial for governments to uphold their commitments back home.</p><p>Whatever agreements may be arrived upon, and whoever they may favor, it ultimately falls to each country to act on them because the stakes are nothing less than delivering their people from devastating impacts of a warming world.</p><div><br/></div><div><em><strong>This story was produced as part of the COP30 Climate Change Media Partnership, a journalism fellowship organized by Internews&#x27; Earth Journalism Network and the Stanley Center for Peace and Security.</strong></em></div>

<p>UN Secretary-General António Guterres appealed to governments to “show willingness and flexibility” in securing outcomes that safeguard communities and keep the 1.5°C goal of the Paris Agreement within reach.</p>

UN Secretary-General António Guterres appealed to governments to “show willingness and flexibility” in securing outcomes that safeguard communities and keep the 1.5°C goal of the Paris Agreement within reach.

Survival, justice: UN chief echos voices in the frontlines of climate change

News

Entertainment

Lifestyle

Sports

Metro.Style

More

Sudoku

Word of the Day

Lotto

Horoscope

Nation

Survival, justice: UN chief echos voices in the frontlines of climate change

Raphael Bosano,

ABS-CBN News

Published November 21, 2025 11:30 AM PHT

Read More:

COP30

Climate Change

UN Secretary General

Antonio Guterres

Philippines

Brazil

ABS-CBN is the leading media and entertainment company in the Philippines, offering quality content across TV, radio, digital, and film. Committed to public service and promoting Filipino values, ABS-CBN continues to inspire and connect audiences worldwide.

Corporate

Investors

Governance

International Distribution

Corporate

Governance

Investors

International Distribution

NPC Seal of Registration

Privacy Policy

AI Policy

Terms of Service

Advertise with Us

© 2026 ABS-CBN Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

NPC Seal of Registration

Privacy Policy

Terms of Service

AI Policy

Advertise with Us

© 2026 ABS-CBN Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

NPC Seal of Registration

Privacy Policy

Terms of Service

AI Policy

Advertise with Us

© 2026 ABS-CBN Corporation. All Rights Reserved.