BEIJING, in China, has began to take action regarding its polluted air. The air there is so dark and dirty that flights oftentimes get delayed or cancelled.

What is worse is the escalating cost of air pollution-related sicknesses. More and more people are dying, getting affected and are demanding a change.

Why did Beijing have to allow the air to reach such bad levels?

Could Beijing officials not have learned from  history and planned their city and develop it?

This may be the single most positive action yet since China has overtaken the United States as the world’s most polluted country, in terms of greenhouse gas emissions.

I have often wondered how the people of Beijing could take all that polluted air?

How could they live a life in such an environment?

Now, with China hopefully geared to solving its problem, China may be the active player in the UNFCCC. In Durban, China pushed for the Kyoto Protocol though nothing was adopted.

I hope that China will see the light and use its wealth and technology to abate the situation and become a leader in the Climate Change dialogue.

Should the Chinese do so, then the wheels of development may take the right direction.

Germany is keen on going Solar and Wind, at the same time replacing Nuclear energy.

The Germans argue that the Earth cannot take much more CO2 and the threat of a nuclear holocaust is real.

While these conditions are unfolding, La Niña is here with a vengeance for climate change knows no time schedule.

Brazil and parts of South America are flooded.

Our country continues to be victim of landslides and flash floods. After Typhoon Sendong that ravaged the island of Mindanao last December, another landslide occurred in a mining community in Compostela Valley.

How many more lives must be lost?

How much more damage must be done -- before we heed the call to conserve our planet?

The need to change is now.

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(Antonio M. Claparols is President of the Ecological Society of the Philippines, IUCN- Member IUCN-CEESP. Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ; This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ; http//www.esp.org.ph)