Climate action takes center stage in Obama dialogue with APEC execs

The US president has taken the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) 2015 CEO Summit as an opportunity to call for action on climate change.

Eschewing protocol, President Barack Obama moderated a panel discussion with Alibaba Group founder Jack Ma and Filipino entrepreneur Aisa Mijeno during the CEO summit in Manila on Wednesday.

"Part of what we thought would be useful was to have a young, new entrepreneur, a young-at-heart but not as young large entrepreneur compare notes about why they think it is good in a business sense as well as in an environmental sense,” Obama said.

The president of the US, the second largest emitter of greenhouse gases, noted how passionate Ma was about the need to combat climate change.

The Alibaba founder shared: “Well, it is not the passion; it is the concern or worry. When I was 12 years old, I went to swim in a lake and I almost died in that lake because the water was much deeper than I thought. About five years ago I went to that lake again.”

The e-commerce giant decided to set aside 0.3 percent of revenues six years ago to encourage and enable young people find creative ways to solve the problem, Ma noted. 

"The opportunity always lies in the place where people worry. If you solve the worry problem, that is the greatest opportunity you have,” he added.

The Sustainable Alternative Lighting (SALt) was touted as an example of an innovative technology addressing the effects of climate change.

Mijeno, along with her brother, founded SALt to primarily bridge the light inequality gap in the Philippines by providing saltwater-powered lamps to the country’s poor.

"Now most of these families are not connected to power grids so they mainly use kerosene and fuel based lamps and we know the danger they pose. They can cause fire accidents and emit black carbon,” Mijeno said.

An engineer, Mijeno came up with a $20 lamp that uses saltwater. The device lasts for eight hours and another eight hours after every refilling of saltwater.

"Aisa is a perfect example of what we are seeing in a lot of countries — young entrepreneurs coming up with leapfrog technologies,” Obama said.

Entrepreneurs like Mijeno, however, face hurdles in going forward. These include the lack of financing and regulatory barriers.

"What we need is a support system from both the private sector and the government to mentor and guide us how we can scale up the product,” Mijeno said.

"And yes, we also need a lot of support in terms of funding,” she quipped, prompting Obama and Ma point fingers at each other while the audience applauded and cheered.

Ma earlier told the US president the government should cut taxes or even exempt start-up and smaller entrepreneurs from duties.

"I do think  there is a role for the government to provide tax incentives for the production of clean energy,” Obama said. — TJD, GMA News