President of Legislative Yuan Wang Jin-pyng (王金平);
Vice President of Legislative Yuan Hung Hsiu-Chu (洪秀柱);
President of the Republic of Kiribati Anote Tong;
Parliament Speaker of the Republic of Nauru Ludwig Derangadage Scotty and Ms. Scotty;
Speaker of the National Parliament of Solomon Islands Allan Kemakeza;
Speaker of the Nitijela of the Republic of the Marshall Islands Donald F. Capelle and Ms. Capelle;
Speaker of the Parliament of the Republic of Kiribati Taomati Iuta;
Parliament Speaker of Tuvalu Otinielu Tauteleimalae Tausi;
Secretary General of the Asian-Pacific Parliamentarians' Union (APPU) Central Secretariat Tetsuya Hirose;
Minister of Foreign Affairs David Y. L. Lin (林永樂);
Ladies and gentlemen;
Good morning!
First of all, on behalf of the government and people of the Republic of China, I want to welcome all of our guests, and to specially thank those who have traveled a long way to be here in Taiwan for this very meaningful event. I was previously invited in 2009 to speak at the 40th APPU General Assembly, which was also held here in Taipei, and I feel very honored and fortunate to be here again with distinguished guests from the 14 member nations of APPU. The experts gathered here have a great deal of insight on the state of affairs in this region, so I'm quite certain we can look forward to a lot of very fruitful discussions.
As you are all aware, the Asian-Pacific Parliamentarians' Union (APPU) is the successor to the Asian Parliamentarians' Union (APU). The APU was founded in 1965, with the strong support of former Japanese Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi, as an important platform for liaison between parliamentarians throughout Asia. The organization was renamed the Asian-Pacific Parliamentarians' Union in 1980. For the past 50 years, the APPU has provided an important platform for discussions of many key issues. The theme of this year's General Assembly is the prevention and mitigation of regional natural disasters, which is a very timely topic indeed.
I first came to APPU in the year 1970, when I was only a second-year student at the Law Department of National Taiwan University, probably before all of you were born. It was the sixth year after the establishment of APU. At that time, the chairman from Taiwan was Mr. Gu Zheng-gang (谷正綱). I remember the guest of honor was Mr. Philip Graham, a congressman from the United States. So, 44 years have passed, and I'm quite honored to be here again.
I'm really impressed by the importance you attach to the issue of climate change and disaster relief. Taiwan was the victim of a serious disaster five years ago, when we were hard hit by Typhoon Morakot. Let me just tell you how serious it was. In the Visitors Center of Ali Mountain, which is a tourist attraction at an elevation of 2,000 meters above sea level, there was a flood of two meters. Over a period of three or four days, the accumulated rainfall reached almost 3,000 millimeters. That was a world record. The rainfall actually exceeded the yearly rainfall for the whole of Europe. More than 700 people were killed due to landslides or other reasons, so we have developed a relatively elaborate system of disaster relief in the years since Typhoon Morakot, and it has proved quite effective in preventing similar incidents from occurring again.
I think it's also very important to let you know that the reason why we attach so much importance to climate change and disaster relief is that, in the Pacific area in general, the temperature rose roughly 0.74 degrees in the last century, but in the lower elevations of Taiwan it went up 1.2 degrees. So it's quite clear that we will encounter, sooner or later, the devastating effects of climate change, so we have to be prepared. Unfortunately, the Republic of China has not been able to participate in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) because we lost our representation [in the UN] back in 1971 under the General Assembly Resolution 2758. But we try our best to comply with the requirements of the UNFCCC as well as the Kyoto Protocol. Right after I was inaugurated, I declared that we will reduce our greenhouse gas emissions in 2020 to the level of 2005, and we will reduce greenhouse gas emissions in 2025 to where they were in the year 2000. So far, we have been able to increase our energy efficiency by 2.3% each year. If we are able to continue this pace, we are in a good position to make good on our promises to the international community.
This is very important. Why? Because when I took office six years ago, our population was 23 million, or roughly 0.3% of the world's total population, but our greenhouse gas emissions at that time were about 1% of the total emissions of the world. That is quite serious. So we've tried our best to reduce our emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, and we've also passed a law to spur the development of renewable energy in Taiwan. And it's very important to note that, right now, the emissions have gone down. As I said, in 2006, our emissions were close to 1% of the world total, but now they are down to 0.8%. And in terms of per capita emissions, we used to rank 18th in the world, but now we're down to 23rd. So we have done our part in spite of the fact that we have not been able to join either the UNFCCC or the Kyoto Protocol. After all, the Republic of China is a responsible stakeholder in the international community, and we will continue to be.
Finally, I would like to extend my personal thanks to the hard-working staff at the Legislative Yuan, under the wise direction and leadership of President Wang Jin-pyng. I do hope this year's General Assembly will yield consensus on how we can work together on the prevention and mitigation of regional natural disasters. I look forward to a successful event, and wish every one of you the best of good health and success. And, last but not least, I hope that those of you who have come to visit Taiwan for the first time, please, try to take time out of your very busy conference schedule to visit the National Palace Museum to see the treasures of the last 30 centuries of China. And also, if you have still more time, please visit the night markets of Taipei, where you can taste many delicious local foods. It's a great way to appreciate the very rich cultural life of this country. Once again, thank you for joining us this time.