Almost a couple of years ago, mudslides caused by heavy rains claimed over 200 lives in the Southern Leyte and Caraga regions in the Visayas and Mindanao. The incident pales in comparison to the 1991 Ormoc tragedy, where about 8,000 people perished when floodwaters rampaged through the town with nary a warning.
Severe deforestation has been the main cause of these floods. Haribon data show that the Philippines’ forest cover has shrunk from 210,000 square kilometers in 1900 to a mere 8,000 square kilometers in 1990 – or a shocking 3.8 percent of the 1900 level. Unchecked, our forests will vanish before our eyes in this generation.
The pillage and destruction of our forests continue, despite claims by government agencies and conservation groups that illegal logging has been significantly curtailed. Mount Isarog in Camarines Sur is a success story claimed by the Haribon Foundation, a conservation group that has taken the lead in educating Filipinos about the country’s wonderful biodiversity and the need to protect and conserve it. But here’s a lead Haribon should seriously consider. A Bicolano journalist friend of mine swears that hardwood lumber continues to be sourced from the mountain, smuggled to the cities, and purchased by moneyed individuals who use it to beautify their homes in the form of furniture.
Forest cover is not the only critical resource that is on the brink of annihilation. The Philippines’ rich biodiversity is under siege, and time is running out. But first, let me regale you with some facts from the Haribon databank.
Of the total number (1,140) of wildlife species (including mammals, reptiles, amphibians and birds) found in the Philippines, half of them (570) are endemic or native to these shores. The country’s coral reef areas (30,000 sq.km.) comprise 5 percent of the world’s total. We are also home to the world’s second largest eagle (Philippine Eagle), the hardest wood variety (Philippine Iron Wood, or Magkuno), the largest and longest snake species (Reticulated Python), the largest bats (Large Flying Fox and Golden Crowned Flying Fox) and the largest clam (Giant Clam), among many others.
Our tiny and not-so-tiny treasures include the smallest primitive primate (tarsier), smallest deer (mouse deer), the smallest food fish (Tabios), around 21,000 species of insects, and some 15,000 species of plant life.
This treasure-trove of life in this string of islands in the Western Pacific would have made up a paradise-like landscape, teeming with color and vibrant with life. Instead, we have wasted the beauty and sanctity of our environment, unwittingly condoning a scorched-earth policy in our mad rush to industrialize and stave off the hunger of a population literally bursting at the seams.
Besides the alarming rate of forest loss, our mangrove area has shrunk to roughly 25 percent of its 1900 level at 112,400 hectares. Hundreds of our wildlife and marine life are threatened with extinction. There are a number of plants and animals on the endangered list. The highest rate of destruction and consumption has taken place only in the last few decades, tragic enough to make the heavens weep.
My journalist friend adds the sorry plight of the Bicol National Park to this tragedy. Once teeming with tall, centuries-old trees, this natural preserve is now a grassy landscape of shrubs and saplings. Until the early ‘90s, villagers hawked charcoal and furniture from freshly cut lumber to passing motorists. Drive through the meandering highway cutting across the park and you will see tell-tale trails where groups of people sit and wait around for the bus, evidence of thriving communities living within the park’s thin foliage propped up along the highway, to camouflage the wanton pillaging (of whatever is left) that continues today.
Never mind the naked greed that drives illegal loggers, miners and traders to cut down a whole swathe of forests or to trawl our seas indiscriminately. Our wholesale apathy to our environment and the reckless and unenlightened manner with which we pursue our living may be just as damaging.
In remote Barangay Matarinaw along the fringes of the Eastern Samar coast, the sleepy fishing community hears the dull thud of dynamites exploding underwater from afar. It is a regular feature in their daily lives. Many of them have partaken of the illegal harvest from this practice. They are oblivious of the cruel cause-and-effect relationship between their explosive trade and the dwindling marine population in their area.
We don’t have to go far to witness the irresponsible behavior that has set us off towards environmental disaster. It wasn’t long ago when fish were to be found aplenty in the Pasig River, then a clear waterway that was a place to safely bathe in. By the 1990s, the river was a polluted and lifeless canal where manufacturing effluents were expelled and human excreta from squatter colonies combined to produce a toxic and foul-smelling mixture.
During the Ramos administration, then-First Lady Ming Ramos championed a drive to restore the Pasig River to a habitable state. The Piso Para Sa Pasig drive initiated by the Clean and Green Foundation envisioned this restoration through an extensive rehabilitation program, including dredging of the river, stopping the effluents from pouring in, and cleaning up the garbage that choked it of life. The drive had a timeline of 15 years to raise the funds and achieve its goals. It would be interesting to find out how this campaign has fared since then.
A story about an endangered eagle being "put to sleep" is in the news. A Crested or Changeable Hawk Eagle was found in the foothills of Mt. Banahaw, mortally wounded, apparently due to gunshots. Hawks and eagles are common enough items being peddled along Metro Manila streets by opportunist knaves. Incredibly, I’ve seen motorists stop and inquire about these birds, intending to purchase them as pets.
A joint government and United Nations report projects that there will be 168 million Filipinos by 2033, double the estimated 2004 population of 84 million. Clearly, something has to be done to avoid a head-on collision between runaway population and the unabated and indiscriminate use and abuse of our natural resources.
While judicious use of legislative and police functions of the government can control industrial utilization of our plants and animals, there is a greater challenge to enlist the cooperation of every single citizen of the country. After all, it is not easy to drum sense into a hungry man, not to mention a hungry man with several hungry children. When all is said and done, this group, said to comprise 15 percent of our population (those, according to recent surveys, who have missed a meal in a period of three months) will listen to the logic of their grumbling stomachs before they will listen to the long-term sensibility of conservation.
The efforts of Haribon, and the other conservation groups are commendable enough. But the need to educate all of the 84 million souls is formidable. The only viable solution to bring this wanton destruction to a halt is for every Filipino to stop the killing, harvesting, trapping, selling and buying of these irreplaceable and irrecoverable treasures. There is no middle ground.
Haribon has identified media and the press as the most effective vehicles to bring home this urgent message. TV, in particular, seems to be the most pervasive among those surveyed. I say include radio in the list as well. In the far-flung areas like Barangay Matarinaw in Eastern Samar or in the Simara Island in Romblon, we need to let everybody in on this danger and rally everyone to do the right thing. It will not be easy; the shadow of illiteracy and hunger will cloud their view of the world and their priorities. But it must be done.
In a recent appreciation party for donors, Julian Tongson, VP of Haribon Foundation, thanked all foreign and domestic donors, as it emphasized the need to attract local funding support for its programs. In the midst of donor fatigue, the question arises as to why we should give to Haribon when there are many other organizations in the Philippines doing conservation work.
Tongson quickly gave three reasons. First, Haribon is the largest membership-based Filipino conservation organization with a pioneering track record. Second, and lest it be mistaken as a radical activist, its core is made up of dedicated scientists, community development workers and business and management people. Third, it has a network of alliances and partnerships in the international science and conservation community. Add to these the local media, performing arts, local government, fisher folks and farming communities that enable Haribon to effectively promote conservation with the Filipino general public and the communities near biodiversity areas, thus leveraging every conservation investment to maximum effect.
The Philippines has the most number of flora and fauna in relation to its area and size. Providence has gifted us so. It is time to extend help to environment protection groups with whatever resources we can share so they can continue to pursue their noble work. But more important, it is time we stop squandering what little remains, and, perhaps, we may see deliverance for the Filipino race as well. It is time to take our final stand on this issue, lest the whole country drowns in an apocalyptic national deluge.