MANILA, Philippines — The dumping of artificial white sand along the rocky shore of Manila Bay was met with concern and criticisms from fishers and environmental organizations who have long been calling for a genuine rehabilitation of the bay.
The groups said that the “ill-conceived” project of the government failed to comply with at least five laws on the environment and culture and could potentially harm not only the bay’s marine ecosystem but also communities in and around the area.
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The “beach nourishment” project was part of the government’s Manila Bay rehabilitation program launched in January last year to save the bay from decades of degradation as ordered by the Supreme Court in 2008, according to Department of the Environment and Natural Resources Undersecretary Benny Antiporda.
Responding to the project’s critics, Antiporda accused them of “capitalizing on the good deeds of the government.”
"I would rather come up with constructive criticism that they come in and help us in what we’re doing. Kasi ang question here is where are they when Manila Bay was almost biologically dead?" the DENR official told Philstar.com in a phone interview last week.
“If di nila ginawan ng paraan noon, ginawan ng paraan ngayon ng gobyerno. Sana tulungan nila kami in a sense na tumulong sila in honest to goodness. I haven’t heard them cleaning up a coastal area. Wala silang projects na ginagawa,” he added.
Although most are staffed by volunteers and do not have the same resources as an entire government department with a legal mandate, groups did not just sit there and do nothing while the bay faced pollution, overexploitation of fishery resources, habitat conversion and degradation.
Coastal clean-ups
Contrary to Antiporda’s claim, organizations criticizing the “white sand” dumping such as Kalikasan People’s Network for the Environment and Pambansang Lakas ng Kilusang Mamamalakaya ng Pilipinas (PAMALAKAYA) had been conducting coastal clean-ups and mangrove restoration on the bay even before the government’s rehabilitation program began.
“Recognizing solid waste as one of the pollutants, we regularly organize coastal clean-up along Manila Bay’s coastal communities,” PAMALAKAYA told Philstar.com.
“We likewise promote proper waste disposal and management among the communities through engagement with local governments and concerned government agencies to support the community with such programs,” the fishers' group added.
ATM: Fishers, urban poor, and environmentalists hold "People's Coastal Clean-up Against Reclamation" in Baseco, Manila.#ManilaBayNotForSale pic.twitter.com/SyIqB1eGTY
— Pamalakaya Pilipinas (@pama_pil) March 17, 2019
Campaign against single-use plastic
Oceana Philippines, one of the organizations opposed to the "white sand" project has also been pushing for legislation and policies that would ban single-use plastic, which contributes to ocean pollution.
In July, it called on the National Solid Waste Management Commission to ban single-use plastic and include it in the priority list of Non-Environmentally Acceptable Products and Packaging.
It noted then that local governments have been moving to pass local legislation against plastic waste but that this needs to be done on a national level.
"The local governments, which are bearing the burden of 'managing' the unmanageable plastics residuals in their areas, raised their voices in sending a strong signal to the commission to fulfill its almost two decades-long unperformed mandate to submit a list of banned items that are unsafe in production, use, post-consumer use, or that produce or release harmful by-products when discarded, Gloria Estenzo Ramos, Oceana Philippines vice president, said then.
"Single-use plastics should be on top of the list that the commission should have done 19 years ago.If the production and trade of hundreds of millions of single-use plastics are not banned, its collection is forever the sole responsibility of the municipality or city," she also said.
Recycling and coastal cleanups alone would never be enough to keep plastic waste away from our oceans. Let’s #BreakFreeFromPlastic by refusing single-use plastics! #DiNaSingle https://t.co/GtoBuGwGwF
— Oceana Philippines (@oceana_ph) September 29, 2019
In February, environmental organization Greenpeace asserted that banning single-use plastics is a feasible option, saying there are alternatives to single-use plastics available already.
"Currently, Filipino taxpayers shoulder the cleanup, health and environmental costs of plastics. Rather than giving companies more excuses to pass the costs and responsibility to people, the ban should be used to mandate these companies to implement refill and reuse systems for their products," it also said then.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature said that over 300 million tons of plastic are produced annually, with at least 8 million tons ending up in oceans and causing severe injuries and death among marine species.
Meanwhile, the Philippines is the third-largest source of plastic pollution globally, according to a 2015 report by the Ocean Conservancy charity and the McKinsey Center for Business and Environment.
Fight vs reclamation
The groups also do more than coastal clean-ups.
“We have been opposing the fixation of government and big business to dump and fill the coastal areas—the very definition of land reclamation—since 2012. They refuse to acknowledge that this is no different from dumping garbage over coastal areas,” Leon Dulce, Kalikasan PNE national coordinator, told Philstar.com.
PAMALAKAYA also said it “actively” fights projects such as reclamation and conversion that displace thousands of fishing and urban poor families and threaten to harm the environment.
“PAMALAKAYA was at the forefront of struggle against the reclamation for the Navotas dumpsite in 2004, which is the culprit for ton-loads of garbage that polluted the bay. We are victims [along] with Manila Bay of these reclamation projects that displaced us and took away our sources of livelihood,” it said.
The group added it has submitted formal complaints before the DENR and the Office of the Ombudsman against several reclamation activities that are ongoing in Cavite such as the land reclamation project of the Bacoor City local government and the Sangley Point International Airport.
Residents of Brgy. Taliptip, a coastal village in Bulakan town, and supporters are in front of San Miguel Corp’s main office to protest the construction of an aerotropolis in Bulacan. They say fisherfolk there would lose their homes and their livelihood. | @gaeacabico pic.twitter.com/YNFtUq6gyX
— Philstar.com (@PhilstarNews) October 17, 2019
It slammed the DENR for granting an environmental compliance certificate to the land reclamation project in Bacoor City and for “consistently being mum” on big-ticket reclamation projects across the bay.
The groups, along with Oceana Philippines, are also opposing the construction of New Manila International Airport, which will be built on mangrove forests and coastal communities in Bulacan. Some residents of Barangay Taliptip in Bulacan have left their homes in exchange for compensation.
Coastal development projects are seen to adversely affect the habitat of marine species and wetlands and destroy a source of fish catch for residents.
Reclamation projects will also make coastal communities susceptible to liquefaction during earthquakes and aggravate flooding in low-lying areas.
According to a BusinessWorld report, there were around 25 proposed projects to reclaim 30,000 hectares of Manila Bay from Navotas City to Cavite.
NewsX: Fed by the waters
‘Genuine’ rehabilitation
In a 2008 landmark ruling, the Supreme Court said the government should lead in restoring Manila Bay to its former glory.
“The tasks ahead, daunting as they may be, could only be accomplished if those mandated, with the help and cooperation of all civic-minded individuals, would put their minds to these tasks and take responsibility. This means that the State, through petitioners, has to take the lead in the preservation and protection of the Manila Bay,” the ruling read.
Instead of filling a stretch of the bay’s shore with crushed dolomite, authorities should instead find ways to reduce pollution on the bay, restore seagrass plains and mangrove forests and improve the management of protected areas.
Environment, fishers' and church groups, said in a position paper Tuesday, that the dumping of artificial white sand should be halted and the government officials behind the project should be held accountable.
Kalikasan’s Dulce, for his part, stressed the importance of criticizing projects that could potentially harm the people.
“We call on the public to help our fellow citizens understand why we need to call out a waste of taxpayer’s money that will further cost us our health and safety. Kalusuagan at kapakanan din natin ang nakataya kaya sama sama nating tiyakin kung ano ang dapat na rehabilitasyon sa Manila Bay,” he said.