TAIPEI — Taiwan is seeking to improve cooperation with the Philippines in weather forecasting and has proposed the establishment of a Typhoon Center, Taiwan government officials told a foreign media delegation Saturday.

Timothy Chin-tien Yang, minister of Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said there is a vital need for greater meteorological cooperation with the Philippines and other countries in the region because of the apparent increase in the ferocity and unpredictability of weather disturbances which has been described as one of the manifestations of global warming and climate change.

Yang said the awareness of this need became more evident in Taiwan following the devastation inflicted by Typhoon Morakot in August this year. The flashfloods and mudslides triggered by that typhoon killed about 700 people in southern Taiwan and destroyed US$5.3-billion worth of properties and infrastructure. Morakot is considered as one of the worst natural disasters in Taiwan’s recorded history.

Yang said the establishment of such a typhoon center will be one of the ideas that the Chinese Taipei delegation will bring up on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders’ Summit in Singapore.

Kuang S. Yeh, deputy minister of Taiwan’s Ministry of Transportation and Communication, said Taiwan is already helping the Philippines improve its weather forecasting system, noting that weather disturbances that affect Taiwan usually pass through Philippine territory first.

Yeh said Taiwan seeks greater exchange of information with the Philippines to mitigate the effects of weather disturbances that could hit the two countries again.

For its part, the Manila Economic and Cultural Office (MECO) in Taipei said Taiwan plans to help build 15 weather stations all over the Philippines.