Still on Communicating Climate Change

   

Another in the series of significant efforts undertaken by the UPLB Interdisciplinary Program on Climate Change (UPLB-IPCO) to further educate the public regarding the issue of climate change is the seminar conducted at UPLB on 31 January, where two experts from PAGASA and the Mines and Geoscience Bureau (MGB) were invited to speak as resource persons. PAGASA’s Climatologist Rosalinda de Guzman discussed the climate trends in the Philippines as well as that in Laguna.

In general, she said, the Philippines is susceptible to flooding and storm surges.  The Philippines was ranked first in the world in terms of natural disasters, and third in terms of vulnerability to natural disasters in 2011.  Now, how do we in the Philippines fare in terms of the global warning phenomenon?  Our historical data, as presented by the PAGASA Climatologist, indicate that in the last decade temperature increased much faster than it did the previous decades combined.  And in most parts of the Philippines, there has been an increasing rate in rising temperatures so that cold days are becoming warmer and warm nights have become hotter.

We were informed in the seminar that the tropical cyclone trends in the country from 1948-2010 indicate that most of the 19-20 yearly tropical storms that enter the Philippine Area of Responsibility originate originate from the Northwest Pacific.  In spite of the storms, however, the general trend in the Philippines is that of widespread warming.  This is perhaps one reason why more and more we’re experiencing what we normally call in the vernacular as “maalinsangan na panahon” which happens when there’s high humidity and temperature.

Ms. De Guzman concluded by highlighting two major lessons learnt based on PAGASA’s experiences over the years.  First, she pointed to the need for an effective early warning system to warn the public about impending disasters.  Second, there’s need to include in the plans of all LGUs community-based warning systems to mitigate disastrous effects of climate changes.

I must point out that in October 2009, RA No. 9720, otherwise known as the Climate Change Act of 2009, was signed into law.  Among other things, this law provides that the “LGUs shall be the frontline agencies in the formulation, planning and implementation of climate change action plans in their areas, consistent with the provisions of the Local Government Code, the National Framework Strategy on Climate Change and the National climate Change Action Plans.”

At this time, therefore, all LGUs (Barangays, particularly) must already have their respective Climate Change Action Plans.  Funding for the preparation and implementation of this plan shouldn’t be a problem because RA 9729 also provides that a certain portion, some say 5%, of the LGU’s IRA is automatically allocated for this purpose.  The question, now, is, do our Barangays already have such plan?  Presumably, such plan as well provides for a plan of action for relocation of residents and implementation of other mitigating measures.  When asked during the open forum, what percentage of the Barangays in the country, already have their respective Climate Change Action Plans, Ms. De Guzman  said, “just a miniscule.”  She couldn’t give the names of the LGUs that already have said plan, though.

The topic discussed by MGB’s Engr. Patricia Vergel de Dios-Kennedy was very interesting because it dealt with disaster experiences in Laguna and Metro-Manila, which struck very close to “home” for most of those in the audience.  She presented data, including graphic pictures, of disasters in Laguna and Metro-Manila in the last five years.  She also presented pictures of different deadly landslides resulting from heavy rainfall.  Incidentally, rainfall has been increasing not only in terms of frequency but also in volume over the last few years.  Again, this is the effect of climate change.

Engr. Kennedy was asked about a curious case in Los Baños.  Over the years, many have experienced sudden earth shaking in Los Baños, but which apparently have never been detected by the seismographs of MGB.  In fact, Engr. Kennedy said she was not aware of these events.  Many in the audience, however, corroborated the information that, indeed, in Los Baños, there is this phenomenon.  Someone from the audience suggested that this was due possibly to the presence of a geothermal plant in the area, but this has not been confirmed by the appropriate government agency such as the MGB.

Curiously, Engr. Kennedy informed by seminar participants that they (engineers of the MGB) normally do their barangay visit and talk directly to the Barangay officials.  Apparently, this was how they (MGB) distributed copies of their geohazard maps to the barangays concerned. 

The seminar series was sponsored and organized by the UPLB-IPCC, UPLB-SESAM, and the UPLB Environmental Science Society.  It’s, indeed, a laudable effort.

Pix shows part of the seminar audience at the UPLB Operations Room.

Still, I have some personal comments and suggestions.

Given the nature of presentations made by the resource persons invited to speak in the seminar, I’d say that there was no problem in connecting with the UPLB audience.  By and large, those in attendance understood the language and content of the presentations.  Using the same presentation techniques and content treatment, the resource persons would have difficulty reaching a less science-oriented audience.  But that, exactly, is what they’ve been doing, they said.  For example, the MGB experts go directly to barangays to explain their geohazard maps.  And the data of PAGASA are presented in statistical graphs and trends, even in their website.  These are hardly designed for the general public. 

There are various groups interested to get involved in trying to solve the problems of climate change.  Many of these include NGOs and even student and advocacy groups.  My suggestion to these groups is, if you want to make a difference, go help those Barangays plan and implement practical early warning system for natural disasters.  Begin by determining what communication systems and tools are available to residents of communities and use these as the tools to inform and educate people about the hazards in their communities during times of natural calamities.  Use the PAGASA and MGB data and construct understandable messages to the general public.

Come to think of it, if asked to walk my talk, I certainly would like to get involved, if I’m invited to get involved, even pro bono.  But you should understand that I’m not going around volunteering my services, which, for all I know, might not be needed.

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Major IT Trends Affecting Devcom Practice

Three years ago, I talked about three trends in IT that were already affecting the way we practice development communication worldwide.  What I said then remains true today.  Let me recall those issues in the hope that colleagues in the field of devcom, especially devcom education, might refocus certain aspects of their skills development programs for development communicators.  Thus:

Development communication practice today is changing much faster than it did decades ago.  Suffice it to say that in the 50s to the 60s, we were focused on rural and agricultural development issues; in the 70’s our major concerns were in the areas of health, economic development, and population.  In the 80’s, we added environmentalism to our fields of interests.  Then in the 90’s we were into the beginnings of knowledge management. 

Today, we are into varied concerns and development issues worldwide.  We need, however, to strengthen further our efforts at gaining a deeper understanding of what and how exactly we are able to employ devcom as a tool for solving social ills.

A current concern, for example, is the science behind climate change.  But as the climatic pattern changes for the worse, we find ourselves unable to explain more forcefully what this scientific phenomenon actually means in the lives especially of our urban poor.  There are sporadic efforts linking human activities to climate change, but I feel that the gap is wide and deep.  We really need to start at the beginning, which is appropriate scientific literacy from an early age.

Proper appreciation of the significance of climate change necessarily must tackle the issue of whether or not people, even of less schooling, are able to fully understand the meaning of this scientific phenomenon, including their respective responsibilities in insuring that such climate change does not adversely affect our daily lives.  What seems clear to many is that the problems are the responsibility of governments but not theirs as individuals.  In this respect, we may have been remiss of our responsibilities as development communicators.

To me, it is a question of whether or not we are able to educate our citizens regarding their responsibilities while at the same time enjoying the good life that Mother Earth provides us.  Devcom, I have always believed, is both informing and educating in an entertaining way.  This is not a new phenomenon.  For years educators have been talking about learning being a pleasant experience if it is to be effective.

Significant Trends Influencing Development Communication Protocols

Development communication strategies and tools have always been influenced by developments in the field of communication technology.  In the past, we had focused on the specialized use of media not necessarily in the manner that media are used the way they are in mass communication but in the focused use of media for the purpose of informing and educating people particularly in the conceptualization and implementation of human development.

There are very distinct trends in the information technology arena that are playing and will continue to play significant roles in the effective implementation of development communication programs.   Let me focus on these trends briefly

Miniaturization

Communication gadgets today are becoming smaller and smaller.  In terms of capacity to store information, however, they are becoming more powerful.  In the past, more information meant more space.  Today, we have palm-sized computers.  Remember your calculators, for example?  They used to be large pieces of equipment on top of your equally large desks. 

When computers started, they were large frames occupying entire floors of buildings.  And we also used boxes of cards.  Then small computers appeared.  These were called table-top models. They initially used audio tapes, then floppy diskettes, then smaller disks, and now we have flash drives and minute external hard discs and small memory chips.  As these gadgets become smaller and smaller, their capacity to store data and information have increased practically geometrically.  In the very recent past, we talked about kilobytes, then gigabytes.  Now we talk about terabytes.

Development communication practitioners today have taken note of the basic characteristics of our gadgets, which are of larger storage capacities and higher portability coupled with durability.  Clearly, the direction is miniaturization in size and enlargement in capacity.

Miniaturization will continue and gadget designers will intentionally make things tinier and tinier even as they become smarter and smarter.  Look forward to the day when all the data and information you need shall be stored in chips small enough to fit underneath the stick-on label on the power switch of your cellphones.

Digitization

Among other things, digitization enables us to store and work on large volumes of data and materials without having to change the formats of these data and information.  This power enables us to improve substantially our ability to understand and interpret data and information because digitized information makes it much easier for us to rearrange data and arrive at more meaningful interpretations.

The very basic reason why we need to digitize is to enable users, such as development communicators, to work with extremely important and delicate materials without having to worry about damaging the original material itself.  We can, for example, run simulations on digitized versions of our data without fear of accidentally transforming or changing the original data.  A good example of this is when experts use 3-D versions of, say, archeological artifacts for analysis and interpretation.

The additional advantage of digitization is that we can improve the quality of information.  We can easily enhance pictures to convey more relevant meanings to people.  We can store more data and information into smaller spaces that can be transported electronically anywhere for other communication experts to work on.  And most of all, we can transport data and information at the snap of our fingers.

Convergence

Here I am referring to convergence of technologies which has enabled us to combine the features of different media formats.  For example, radio broadcasting now is done through computers and radio programs are even broadcast on television.  All sorts of communication gadgets are put into use and the combined effects have been mind-boggling, something we never thought possible in the early days of radio broadcasting.  Podcasting has long come into vogue and has changed the way in which broadcast communication is practiced, particularly in terms of production techniques.

We are now able to work with large volumes of data and information over much shorter periods of time with much easier processes.  In fact, through mere click of the mouse we are able to transfer, save, store, and retrieve large volumes of materials in split-second.  In short, information processing, storage, and retrieval have become possible in a wink of an eye.

There seems to be no limit to what we can do to improve our system of developing and sharing information.  In other words, the volume of work is no longer a serious variable in performing our communication tasks.

Where Should We Be Heading?

Traditionally, it has always been the engineers, the developers of technology, who have been telling us, “well, here is a gadget, why don’t you find use for it?”  Is it not now possible to tell the engineers, “I want to be able to do this and I can’t do it given existing gadgets, so why not develop one customized to achieve what I want to achieve?”

It’s 2012.  Can we finally catch up? 

I’m sure our colleagues at the UPLB College of Development Communication have thought of innovations in the area of devcom education.  There’s a need to perhaps strengthen devcom training to reflect Dr. Nora Quebral’s new definition of development communication as the “science of human communication linked to the transitioning of communities from poverty in all its form to a dynamic, over-all growth that fosters equity and the unfolding of human potential” (Lecture delivered at the Honorary Doctorate Celebration Seminar, London School of Economics and Political Science, University of London, December 13, 2011). 

Communicating Climate Change

More than two years ago, I spoke on communicating climate change before members of the Philippine Extension Network, Inc., an organization of extensionists in the Philippines.  The things I talked about then were as current then as they still are today, especially in the aftermath of “Sendong” that brought the cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan down to their knees, with perhaps the highest number of flooding casualties in the Philippines in recent years.  I would like to revisit my speech in October 2009 because my suggestions then are as applicable today as they were then.

In October 2009, I suggested only three risk communication strategies to help mitigate the impact of disasters like flash flooding on a massive scale.  Let me reproduce here some of those suggestions, which I called challenges.

Challenge No. 1:  Communicating climate change, a scientific phenomenon, to a largely unscientific audience.  I did a very quick and crude survey among ordinary Filipinos and found some interesting data.  I have suspected this kind of data all along, but I still got surprised when I saw the numbers.   I shall compare these with data from the United States based on a poll conducted by Harris International from November 10-17, 2008. As you can see from Table 1, we do have an unscientific Filipino audience.

Table 1.  What Filipinos believe in.

The Issue	Believe In (%)	Don’t Believe In (%)	Not Sure (%)
God	100	0	0
Heaven	98	1	1
Angels	93	1	6
Jesus is God or the Son of God	92	2	6
The Resurrection of Jesus Christ	92	4	4
Miracles	90	1	9
Hell	89	5	6
The Devil	87	4	9
The Virgin Birth	85	7	8
Creationism	83	7	10
Survival of the Soul After Death	83	8	9
Ghosts	68	11	21
Witches	43	21	33
Astrology	38	41	27
Darwin’s Theory of Evolution	34	41	25
UFOs	26	26	48

In table 2, we also see an unscientific American audience.  However, it would be much easier to educate American audiences about climate change compared to their Filipino counterparts.   This is probably one time that we Filipinos should imitate the Americans.  Even so, it appears there would still be a long way to go.

Table 2.  What Americans believe in.

The Issue	Believe In (%)	Don’t Believe In (%)	Not Sure (%)
God	80	10	9
Miracles	75	14	12
Heaven	73	14	13
Jesus is God or The Son of God	71	17	12
Angels	71	17	12
The Resurrection of Jesus Christ	70	18	13
Survival of the Soul After Death	68	15	17
Hell	62	24	13
The Virgin Birth	61	24	15
The Devil	59	27	14
Darwin’s Theory of Evolution	47	32	22
Ghosts	44	39	17
Creationism	40	31	29
UFOs	36	39	25
Witches	31	54	14
Astrology	31	51	18

Source: Mooney & Kirshenbaum (2009), Unscientific America.

We have here in the Philippines a decidedly “unscientific” audience who ranked Darwin’s theory of evolution 15^th out of 16, and prefer to believe in the presence of ghosts and witches. 

Interestingly, few also believe in astrology, and yet, there are hordes of people consulting the palm readers of Quiapo.  This could be taken to mean we have in our hands a confused audience, but an audience that probably has a strong belief system that is less than scientifically-oriented.  The question now is, how do we communicate scientific phenomena to an unscientific audience?  That our science communicators could do much to inform and educate the public about the ill-effects of climate change is a given, but they could also be overwhelmed by the very strong belief systems of their audiences.

Climatic change is a very sophisticated scientific phenomenon, and we must communicate this to a largely unscientific audience.  That is a challenge, indeed. 

Perhaps our pollsters should consider doing more surveys to find out the magnitude in which Filipinos appreciate scientific knowledge so we can at least try to figure out how we could communicate more effectively and efficiently the topic to the public, and perhaps bother less with who will win the presidency today since the elections would not be held today, anyway.

Let us try to recall past thinking on the topic of climate change.    Those of us who have been trying to communicate climate change know that we are dealing with a public that tends to reject the idea that change in climatic conditions is due to human activity.  Our public has always been of the belief that any changes in the climate has always been the handiwork of God.

This is hardly the time for a side comment, but I find this difficult to pass.  One can always  suggest, at least in jest, that those victims of Typhoon Ondoy who are claiming that  their insurance companies are not willing to underwrite the cost of repairing their cars damaged by Typhoon Ondoy, may probably have to line up in church for loan because in this country, as provided for by insurance rules, an act of God is not covered by insurance.(Well, that's probably not exactly correct as I understand that if you, from the beginning, include such things in what you insure and pay for the premiums they might be covered by insurance.  Not sure about this, though.)

In any case, to believe that climate change happens because of the activities of humans is absolutely a different pattern of thinking.  It is a major shift in paradigm.  And we all know that paradigm shifts always take a long time to gestate.

For example, it has been some 150 years after Darwin published his book, The Origin of the Species, and a large proportion of both the American and Philippine publics remain unable to grapple with the theory of evolution.  In America, less than half of the population believes in the theory of evolution, but that means that more than half of Americans do not really believe in it.  For Filipinos, the dividing line is also very clear.   Only 34% believes in it, while 66% does not.

Here is how Simon Donner, Professor of Geography, University of British Columbia, explains why it is a challenge, indeed, to communicate climate change in a largely “unscientific” world:

From Galileo to Darwin, science is full of examples where new discoveries challenged traditional beliefs.  If history is a guide, it can take decades or centuries for the new science to become the new orthodoxy.  The battle over public acceptance of natural selection is still being fought 150 years after the publication of  Darwin’s The Origin of Species.  The potential for human-induced climate change may not belong on a list of the most fundamental scientific discoveries of last 500 years.  Like those discoveries, however, it does challenge a belief held by virtually all religions and cultures worldwide for thousands of years.  This long view of history needs to be reflected in campaigns to educate the public, who do not have the benefit of years of graduate training in atmospheric science, about the science of climate change.

Challenge No. 2:  Climate change is not a breaking news but an oozing phenomenon.  Science communicators, particularly science journalists, have found it very difficult to report on climate change because it is a phenomenon that is incrementally unfolding and the evidences are only trickling in.  In other words, from the point of view of mass media news parlance, the story is not breaking (except in the case of Typhoon Ondoy and other similar cases), it is simply oozing or very slowly flowing.  Such was how it was described by Boyce Rensberger, director of the Knight Science Journalism Fellowships at the MIT (Chandler, 2008) during a panel discussion on “disruptive environments” held last year. 

Panelists were tackling the theme “communicating climate change: science, advocacy and the media.”  Perhaps it is not only a question of how the phenomenon unfolds that is making it difficult for journalists to cover; it is probably partly because the scientists also are finding it difficult to explain why climate change is happening the way it does – oozing, instead of breaking.

An important concept that is always hammered into the heads of aspiring reporters in college is the concept of “breaking news,” which means “it is happening now.”  Climate change is happening now, all right, but why does it not carry the same urgency as, say, breaking news about an ongoing bank heist?  The big difference is that the bank heist happens in just a few minutes if not seconds, while climate change happens anywhere from decades to millions of years.   From the point of view of the public, climate change, unless it translates itself into catastrophic typhoons and floods like Typhoon Ondoy was, appears to be a long, long way into the future and so the urgency is not even perceptively felt.  Scientists, however, feel it is an issue that is absolutely urgent and something must be done now.  Looking at the long-term trend based on data collected over so many years, experts are seeing a quickening of the rate at which climatic conditions are changing.  What they are seeing, based on scientific models and means, is making them more scared.  But the public, not knowing the workings of science, does not appreciate this situation and, therefore, does not feel the same level of urgency so it is not significant information that warrants action right away.  In other words, as it is considered to be act of God, so shall it be.

Do we have a choice in this situation?  It appears we do not have much choice for now.  We will have to continue with efforts at informing and educating the public about the significance of our changing climatic conditions.  There are ways of doing this, such as focusing on the public’s experience with, say, the El Niño and La Niña phenomena because these are events directly affecting the daily lives of people.       

One of the panelists in last year’s discussion at MIT was MIT’s Kerry Emanuel, professor of atmospheric science, who attracted worldwide attention when, just a few weeks before Hurricane Katrina slammed into New Orleans last year, he published a paper predicting the increased intensity of hurricanes due to global warming.   Emanuel’s comment in the panel discussion rings loud and clear when he said, “when it comes to explaining complex scientific work to the media and the public, scientists are ‘not very well trained’.”  Still, Emanuel said, it should be pointed out quite clearly that science, indeed, is built on incremental progress and could be explained only in terms of simplified metaphors, which also invites criticisms from other scientists because metaphors are not exact (Chandler, 2008).

The message is rather clear: climate change is an unfolding phenomenon, and communicating it to the public is always work in progress.  Given such a situation, therefore, the communication expert would now have to devise ways and means of making such a content much more understandable to the public and invite appropriate action to mitigate the phenomenon.  This is a process of informing and educating people, and everybody knows how slow and painstaking it is to educate people, especially when they refuse to be educated.

Challenge No. 3:  Reframing climate change as communication message.  Framing is a concept focusing on building a storyline that sets “specific stream of thought in motion, communicating why an issue might be a problem, who or what might be responsible for it, and what should be done about it” (Nisbet, 2009).  Framing is a technique of focusing the message, and audiences usually rely on frames of messages to make sense of an issue.  Journalists use frames to create interesting stories and reports.  Framing also means making systematic and critical choices of the nature of information to be communicated giving greater weight to certain considerations and other elements over others.

In the last two decades, research in political communication and sociology has added more knowledge about the communication phenomenon of framing.  Research has helped explain how media portrayals of events and issues interact with cultural forces to shape public views of complex policy debates on significant topics like climate change.

With proper framing, climate change could be made highly relevant to public needs and concerns than it otherwise could be under normal situations.  For example, there was great opportunity during the Metro-Manila flash floods that accompanied Typhoon Ondoy on September 26, 2009 to explain that there was flood because the rainfall that normally would have fallen in 30 days was poured in six hours.  This was a result of global warming, of climate change.  Of course, explaining this situation in more understandable ways would mean we need more information to include in our explanation.

According to Nisbet (2009), it should be pointed out that not every individual cares about the environment or would defer to the authority of science.   However, if the message about climate change is framed according to certain beliefs without necessarily changing its scientific foundations, then perhaps the public might have another view of it. 

Nisbet (2009) suggests that we look at possible frames for the subject matter “climate change.”   These frames could include the “economic development frame” which would essentially mean recasting climate change as an opportunity to grow economically.  Hence, we could use phrases like “innovative energy technology” or “sustainable economic prosperity.”  We could talk about conditions where our agricultural production system was devastated by the typhoon and all rice fields were flattened by wind and water, and all the grains buried under water or mud.  Destruction of property was of a magnitude we could hardly describe. 

Another frame would be the “morality and ethics” frame which was used in Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth.    Why is it, for example, that the developing countries that contribute less than one percent of the gas emissions that cause global warming, have to suffer the brunt of climate change catastrophes?  Not only that, they are also expected to spend as much in mitigating climate change.

Another frame has recently emerged.  This is called the “public health” frame, which focuses on health implications of climate change.  This frame was very clearly present in the aftermath of Typhoon Ondoy, and all other natural catastrophes.  The other way of looking at it is that changing climatic conditions affect adversely our biological conditions and cause health disruptions that could range from mild to serious and fatal.

Through appropriate framing of the message, it is possible to create interpretive storylines that can be used to “bring diverse audiences together on common ground, shape personal behaviour, or mobilize collective action” (Nisbet, 2009).

Concluding Statement.  So, to review the challenges now, we have to do better in informing and educating our publics about a scientific phenomenon even if such publics may not be scientific in their thinking and actions.  We have to seek ways and means of explaining to people that climate change is not a one-time phenomenon that does not come back once it has happened but  a continuing phenomenon.  Also, we have to make sure that our angles of interpretation,  information, as well as education fit into the mind sets of people so that the message sinks in right away and people act immediately accordingly.

Let me conclude with a Chinese saying that has been made gender-sensitive.  It runs like this.  To be a dignified human, one has to sire an off-spring , write a book, and plant a tree.

My friends, siring an off-spring is probably not a mandatory requirement to stay alive.  Many have survived without off-springs, and the world has survived as well.  Much less write a book.  Most of us, in fact, wouldn’t bother to even think of it and the world will not perish.  Planting a tree would perhaps have the most lasting effect on this earth and on mankind.  So, isn’t it about time you started celebrating your being alive by planting a tree on your birthdays?

That’s what I told members of the Philippine Extension Network, Inc. in October 2009 which, I believe, remains applicable today, particularly in relation to the devastating effects of the rains and flooding that accompanied Storm "Sendong".  Fellow development communicators might want to take note.

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