Sustainable growth and improvements in technology are the key ingredients for limiting the impact of climate change, while developed nations need to get serious about reducing emissions, Nobel laureate Thomas Schelling said in Taoyuan yesterday.
"We should not attempt to urge developing countries to sacrifice development significantly in the interest of holding down greenhouse emissions," Schelling said in a speech on global warming and climate change delivered at the National Central University.
Schelling shared last year's Nobel Prize in Economics with Robert Aumann for his work utilizing game-theory to understand conflict and cooperation.
"Developed countries like my country and yours probably should devote the next decade to not only taking this problem seriously, but demonstrating to countries like China that we are taking this seriously," he said.
Only then, he said, can developed nations ask the developing world to "climb on board."
"We have to recognize that the main adverse impact of climate change will be on poorly-developed countries dependent on agriculture and susceptible to diseases that may increase in extent and virulence due to climate change," he said. "Fifty years ago malaria was a severe problem in Taiwan, it is not any longer. The best defense for China, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Guatamala ... is their development."
However, when it comes to Taiwan's prospects in the event of serious global warming, Shaw Daigee (簫代基) of the Chung-hua Institute for Economic Research is not optimistic.
Taiwan is "somewhere between developed and undeveloped," Shaw said yesterday, adding that a sure guide for how much impact global warming is going to have on a country is its climate.
"The more tropical it is, the harder the country is going to get hit," he said at the conference.
Shaw cited rising sea levels as a cause for alarm.
In his speech to a packed conference room of mostly students, Schelling told the crowd that global warming is a problem that is not going to go away.
"I think by the time you are middle-aged you will still be wondering what we are going to do to cope with climate change. By the time you are my age ... it will still be a question," said Schelling, who has worked on global warming related issues for 25 years.
"It took the United States at least a couple of decades to think straight about nuclear policy, and we are just beginning to learn how to think about terrorism," he said, labeling global warming "a new subject."
As for how nations are going to work together, Schelling does not favor the Kyoto protocol approach: "I am very skeptical that we are ever going to have any kind of treaty with enforced quotas."
Instead, he advocates an approach modeled on the Marshall Plan or NATO. He also stressedd the need for countries to spend more on research and development.
A Chinese freighter that allegedly snapped an undersea cable linking Taiwan proper to Penghu County is suspected of being owned by a Chinese state-run company and had docked at the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung for three months using different names. On Tuesday last week, the Togo-flagged freighter Hong Tai 58 (宏泰58號) and its Chinese crew were detained after the Taipei-Penghu No. 3 submarine cable was severed. When the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) first attempted to detain the ship on grounds of possible sabotage, its crew said the ship’s name was Hong Tai 168, although the Automatic Identification System (AIS)
An Akizuki-class destroyer last month made the first-ever solo transit of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship through the Taiwan Strait, Japanese government officials with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. The JS Akizuki carried out a north-to-south transit through the Taiwan Strait on Feb. 5 as it sailed to the South China Sea to participate in a joint exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces that day. The Japanese destroyer JS Sazanami in September last year made the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force’s first-ever transit through the Taiwan Strait, but it was joined by vessels from New Zealand and Australia,
SECURITY: The purpose for giving Hong Kong and Macau residents more lenient paths to permanent residency no longer applies due to China’s policies, a source said The government is considering removing an optional path to citizenship for residents from Hong Kong and Macau, and lengthening the terms for permanent residence eligibility, a source said yesterday. In a bid to prevent the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from infiltrating Taiwan through immigration from Hong Kong and Macau, the government could amend immigration laws for residents of the territories who currently receive preferential treatment, an official familiar with the matter speaking on condition of anonymity said. The move was part of “national security-related legislative reform,” they added. Under the amendments, arrivals from the Chinese territories would have to reside in Taiwan for
CRITICAL MOVE: TSMC’s plan to invest another US$100 billion in US chipmaking would boost Taiwan’s competitive edge in the global market, the premier said The government would ensure that the most advanced chipmaking technology stays in Taiwan while assisting Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) in investing overseas, the Presidential Office said yesterday. The statement follows a joint announcement by the world’s largest contract chipmaker and US President Donald Trump on Monday that TSMC would invest an additional US$100 billion over the next four years to expand its semiconductor manufacturing operations in the US, which would include construction of three new chip fabrication plants, two advanced packaging facilities, and a research and development center. The government knew about the deal in advance and would assist, Presidential
RSS