Leyte. It is said to be the strongest cyclone to make landfall in the Philippines, which also holds true
for the storm surge it induced (WMO, 2013).
According to the World Bank (2010), looking at the EMDAT disaster data base (Guha-Sapir et al.,
2009) leads to the insight that, in the years 2000 to 2008, weather-related disasters accounted for
98% of all the people affected and 78% of all the people that died due to disasters in the Philippines.
Much literature exists covering the issue of climate change and extreme weather related deaths
(other regions or globally). We refer to the IPCC – Fourth Assessment Report, which clearly states
with very high confidence that climate change currently contributes to the global burden of diseases
and premature deaths. Further, they determine an increased number of people suffering from death,
disease and injury due to heatwaves, floods, storms and droughts with high confidence (Confalonieri
et al., 2007; more also in IPCC, 2014).
5.2 Impacts of Climate Change in the Philippines
As we have shown above, the country has an outstanding exposure towards weather and weather
extremes due to its location and shape. To show the importance of the specific threats, we look at
past patterns and features of weather and weather extremes. To prepare for the threat of weather
and weather extremes for each sector in the country, we assess how far within the scientific
literature changes in the climate could be detected and what are the future projections discussed in
the literature for the Philippines. After looking at the climate variables, we analyzed the literature for
the impacts of climate change on the different sectors. As the inter-annual variability plays a very
large role in the local climate, in each of the sub-topics, we refer to the large-scale effects of ENSO (El
Niño Southern Oscillation) and PDO (Pacific decadal oscillation).
5.2.1
Slow-onset changes
Slow-onset changes in the past
Various research is available that deals with the question, of whether or not a change in weather and
climate indices is already observable. The observed temperature in SEA is increasing with a rate of
0.27-0.4°C per decade since the 1960s, which is double the rate of the global average with only
0.13°C per decade in 1956-2005 (Tangang et al., 2006). Chooprateep and McNeil (2014) studied the
monthly surface temperature in SEA and found a temperature increase of 0.174 (±0.025) °C per
decade for the region of the Philippines (for the period 1973 to 2008). Cruz et al. (2007) referred to
an increase in mean annual, maximum and minimum temperatures for the Philippines of 0.14°C from
1971 to 2000 (assumed: change per decade – although not mentioned in the report). Cinco et al.
(2014) applied a trend analysis on observed data from 34 weather stations in the Philippines and
found warming trends in mean, minimum and to a lesser extent in maximum temperatures. Most of
the stations showed an increasing trend for the numbers of hot days.
For the observed precipitation in the country, the weak increasing trend observed by Caesar et al.
(2011) was not significant. Cruz et al. (2007) referred to an increasing trend in annual mean rainfall
since 1980s and in the number of rainy days since 1990s. Further, they stated that mean annual
precipitation is decreasing on the western Coast of the Philippines. Villafuerte et al. (2014a) referred
to contradictory results for precipitation in the North West of the country. Jose et al. (1996) showed
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