Camarines Sur 2nd district Rep. LRay Villafuerte has praised President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. for “walking the talk” on his support for reducing the Philippines’ carbon footprint.

This, as the Philippine capped a trip to Brussels, Belgium where he secured investment pledges from European companies engaged in renewable energy (RE) and sustainable infrastructure solutions.

Villafuerte said the Spanish conglomerate Acciona, for one, has committed to invest in the country’s RE sector during the meeting between its chairman Jose Manuel Entrecanales and Marcos on the sidelines of the European Union-Association of Southeast Asian Nations (EU-ASEAN) Commemorative Summit.

“We find it (the Philippines) welcoming and business-friendly, so we would like to make the Philippines one of our—if not our main hub for the Southeast Asia,” said Acciona in assuring Marcos that it would build “smart infrastructure that is sustainable, mitigating, adapting, resilient and transformative.”

The Philippine leader described Acciona’s planned investments as a welcome development, adding that “there have been a lot of progress in that regard, but we need to do more in terms of building up our renewables ... There is this move to renewables, so we have to adjust ... we’ll have to increase our capacity for production.”

Villafuerte, president of the National Unity Party (NUP), also lauded Marcos for “earning an early win on his climate justice advocacy while still in Brussels after getting the support of European Council (EC) President Charles Michel on his proposal to quickly operationalize the green fund on climate change and the ‘damage and loss' policy".

“In making such a pitch for loss-and-damage compensation, whose concept was agreed upon by participant-countries in last month’s COP27 summit in Egypt, President Marcos has focused global attention anew, whether he likes it or not, on his rising international stature as the champion or unofficial spokesman of the world’s most vulnerable economies that are seeking climate justice from wealthy nations like those in Europe that have grown even richer from being the heaviest carbon polluters,” the Bicolano added.

Last month, Villafuerte said that Marcos "has the moral high ground to champion climate action for all developing states that are reeling from the largely unbridled pollution caused mainly by the world’s richest countries".

He gave this remark on the heels of Marcos's call for collective action from Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) member-states on climate change.