Mayor’s businesses follow  environmental laws

CEBU, Philippines — A 70,000-capacity chicken dressing plant is a huge undertaking that any businessman could not just easily go into and earn millions in the process. It’s not just a flash in the pan achievement because it is not something like dressing a chicken in the backyard to be roasted for a one-night family affair.

Such dressing plant---as big as the DBSN Farms Agriventures Corporation in Albuera, Leyte and serving a not so ordinary client, San Miguel Corporation---commands millions of investments to draw millions of revenues in return.

This makes Mayor Ramon Oñate of Palompon, Leyte a not so ordinary businessman who would not spend millions only to be a violator of laws in the process, as what he had been accused of in a Congressional inquiry. He does business responsibly the reason why he lasts.

Oñate is not a backyard poultryman, but an astute businessman who knows that having a huge business means also a huge responsibility for him to comply. He knows that for one chicken to be dressed, an amount of waste---feathers, entrails, etc. ---is also produced. So, he shared that, if his business dresses thousands of chickens in one setting, the amount of waste is also beyond trite imagination.

When Oñate went into a chicken dressing business with SMC in 2015, one of the unwritten commitments he vowed to accomplish was to make sure he would uphold environmental laws by ensuring that wastes from the plant are properly disposed of. That would guarantee him sustainable trust with SMC the image of an excellent business partner. SMC is a company that has been a staunch defender of the environment and the laws that protect it, and DBSN was not meant to destroy that integrity.

With such partnership with SMC, Oñate made sure that DBSM will not have a shattered image but one that is also a defender of the environment and the laws that protect it, that is because he wanted his business to last.

In the early years, DBSN was cited and penalized by the DENR-Region 8 for improper disposal of wastes costing the company considerable amounts of fines. This drove Oñate to do something substantial too that would address the situation and never to repeat the violations.

With valuable lessons earned, he committed not to have any more condition that would only destroy his businesses. Every violation must be a thing of the past, declared the mayor, as he also wanted to show to his constituents that being a law-abiding citizen is the true mark of leadership worthy of respect, a trait entrenched into his political life through the years.

In doing so, he invested a hundred million more to establish a 2,500-square-meter waste water treatment plant right inside the vast area of the DBSN plant in Albuera, Leyte. Such a commendable investment as this effectively arrested the problem of waste management and disposal of the chicken dressing plant.

An official of the DENR Environmental Management Bureau was so impressed with what Oñate did, which was actually a recommended solution also by the agency earlier. A huge business as the DBSN, if needs sustainability, demands a huge investment in waste management and the mayor did it to solve a huge problem he was facing.

The EMB official said DBSN’s waste water management and disposal plant is, by far, the best ever in the region that other businesses must emulate if only to address environmental and pollution problems.

Aside from the waste management plant, DBSN hired a pollution control officer, waste collectors, waste transporters and rendering personnel to handle solid waste products (feathers and condemned entrails) into animal feeds, fertilizers and oil.

The waste management and disposal program of DBSN covers the collection, segregation, storage, transportation, removal, and disposal of solid poultry by-products; waste water treatment and disposal system; storage and disposal of toxic chemicals, and air pollution control, said the mayor.

Despite this sensible development in the DBSN operations, Oñate was still accused by a congressman of violating environmental laws and committing corrupt practices, which would cause his removal from office as Palompon’s chief executive.

Regarding the allegations that DBSN “has been polluting the water, soil and air of the towns of Palompon and Albuera, where the company is operating,” Oñate answered that the accuser “is very much aware of the legal documents, parameters of environment protection and government permits that the company acquired throughout its operations.”

DBSN has been singled out also that its solid wastes cause the high-level of phosphate that destroyed the water quality of the Boac Creek in Albuera and the Ormoc Bay. The evidence presented by the congressman during the House committee inquiry was actually an outdated one. There was already a retesting of the waters conducted by the DENR only recently showing that there was no longer phosphate exceedance in the area. DENR confirmed that DBSN’s waste water management plant has been so effective in its purpose, thus sludges are no longer effluence into the town’s bay area.

The mayor explained that: “Wastewater treatment and disposal systems are designed to remove contaminants and pollutants from wastewater before it is released back into the environment. The process involves several stages to ensure the water is clean and safe for the ecosystem and human health,” so water from DBSN would not contaminate Ormoc Bay at all.

Oñate further said that, even before DBSN started its business, there were already major industries and agro-commercial businesses using the creek as their effluent outfall. Aside from DBSN, there is this gravel crusher plant, a community-based poultry, washing stations of hauler trucks, a privately owned piggery, and the residents of the barangay themselves.

The allegations that DBSN has been dumping chicken waste from Albuera into his breeder farm in Palompon were unfounded likewise, said Oñate. “As a breeder farm, we only dispose our chicken waste, mainly chicken manure at the end of the breeding cycle, which is after 42 weeks from the start of the operation.”

He added: “We also have a regulated and designated soil conditioner containment area (compost pit) for chicken manure with an environmental compliance certificate (ECC) from the EMB-Region 8 of the DENR-8.”

Oñate described the accusations against his businesses that are allegedly contaminating the water sources in Palompon as “totally absurd” and “political harassment.” He said “this manure has substantial value as organic fertilizer and are most often applied to fields as a replacement for commercial fertilizers.”

Oñate declared that a properly managed breeder farm will not pollute or cause environmental problems to the community, and he said that, contrary to unfounded accusations, he committed himself to manage well both his breeder farm in Palompon, and the dressing plant in Albuera so that these will be models of environmental compliant endeavors consistent with the government aims.

“I have no intentions to violate the laws because I want to sustain my businesses and the preserve my name as a town mayor with dignity and integrity,” said Oñate. “For what purpose shall I do otherwise? I won’t allow myself to be destroyed by hubris, and God is my guide,” added the mayor. — (FREEMAN)