Second National Communications 6 1.5 Anomaly 5 year running mean Temperature Anomaly (°C) 1 Linear (5 year running mean) 0.5 0 y = 0.0159x - 0.3266 -0.5 -1 -1.5 51 56 61 66 71 76 81 86 91 96 1 6 Year Source: PAGASA, Observed mean annual minimum temperature anomalies, Philippines (1956-2003), departure from (1961-1990) normal. An increase of 0.8904 deg C from 1051-2006, Increase in minimum temperatures almost three times increase in maximum temperature. 2.0 Sector situation The Philippines is a signatory to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Here it expressed together with other countries its belief in the principles of sustainable development and environmental preservation based, upholding equity and in consideration of the distinctive capabilities of the participating countries. A year earlier (May 8, 1991), it created the Inter-Agency Committee on Climate Change (IACCC) under the Environmental Management Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). It was a concrete manifestation of the Philippines’ attempt to promptly address the issue of climate change. More recently, the government has formed through an executive order, the Presidential Taskforce on Climate change (PTFCC), with no other than the President heading the entity as acknowledgement of climate change and its importance in affecting our development. Health and climate change figured in the Philippines first national communications for climate change submitted to the UNFCCC in 1999. Here it established initial trends of climate parameters and disease.6 The National Objectives for Health (NOH 2005-2010) does not specifically mention climate change as an area of concern; it rather looks at the health effects from a focused approach. It looks at environmental 6 Philippines First national communications for climate change. Health, Chapter 3, p.15. Available from http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/natc/phinc1.pdf