Sea change

It seems that as the nation and the media continues to be pre-occupied with the IIRC report on the hostage taking fiasco and the jueteng payola, other equally, if not more important concerns have been overlooked. Of course these two sensational incidents must be directly confronted and properly resolved if we want to have a well managed and clean government. But aside from a clean government our country also needs a clean environment to make it really a better place to stay. Indeed it can be truly said without fear of contradiction that a country with clean environment must have a clean government.

Actually, a “September Affair” is held every year that has something to do with nature and with God’s other creation involving more than half a million people in 100 countries. This is an activity that has a greater impact in our lives and the lives of the generations to come but has not attracted media attention because it is carried out without much fanfare. It started 20 years ago along the Texas coast in the USA, when one person, appalled by all the garbage littering the shoreline, organized a coastal clean-up. This small step evolved into the “Ocean Conservancy” movement that has somehow caught the attention of people all over the world including Filipinos so that as of now it has become a world-wide project known as “International Coastal Clean Up” which is considered as the most effective volunteer based conservation project in the globe.

Undoubtedly, trash in the ocean, consisting of grocery bags, bottles, cigarette butts, plastic wrappers, straws and other rubbish that fall “not from the sky but from human hands” have become one of the most extensive pollution problem facing mankind now. The data gathered by the Ocean Conservancy volunteers have produced the only global snap shots and country by country, state by state breakdown of trash in the world’s ocean which made them aware of the deterioration of our oceans and spurs them to a deeper commitment to marine conservation. Ocean Conservancy recognizes the importance of the ocean eco-system in all living things. Hence it has been their mission to protect marine life, the sea animals and the places they live, by removing trash, debris and other garbage from the world’s beaches.

In the Philippines, the volunteers in this coastal clean-up project are the Rotarians and their clubs. The Ocean Conservancy International’s Philippine Coordinator is Rotarian (Rtn) Gerry Reyes of the Rotary Club in Batangas who aptly observed that the “throw away living style of today’s generation has made the wide swath of the Pacific Ocean the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”. Rotarians are therefore doing their part in clearing up the shorelines and in helping small towns across the country create recycling programs.

Of course the Rotarians and other concerned citizens helping them realize that to prevent this pollution problem, the work does not start and end in a single day but the whole year round. So every year in September, Rotarians in the Philippines start the international coastal clean-up.

Specifically a special group of Rotarians who formed an international fellowship spearheads this activity. They are called the International Yachting Fellowship of Rotarians (IYFR) which is the largest and oldest Rotary Fellowship with 100 “fleets” manned by 2,600 members in 21 countries all over the world. The first Philippine “fleet” of IYFR was formed by the Rotary Club of Cubao West (RCCW) last March 18, 2009 under the leadership of Past President Jun Avecilla who became its first “fleet commodore”. The group’s name may sound elitist because of the word “yachting”. But this is only because its pioneers discovered the deteriorating conditions of our oceans while having fellowship on board a yacht. Membership however extends to all persons with deep commitments to clean and preserve our environment particularly our oceans, rivers and other waterways.

In a span of only more than a year, the IYFR Philippine fleet organized by RCCW with 21 members now under commodore Joel Sarmiento, has grown into five fleets: the IYFR Cebu with 25 members headed by fleet commodore Sven Olof Tengelin; the “Hands on” fleet also in Quezon City under fleet commodore Butch Madarang; the Mabuhay fleet under commodore Glady Villar; and the latest one, the “Rainbow Connection” fleet in Bulacan which will have its charter presentation tomorrow at Subic Lighthouse Hotel & Resort, under fleet commodore Oyie Valarao.

Tomorrow, Saturday, September 25, 2010 at 7:30 a.m. also marks the start of this year’s “International Coastal Clean-up Drive” pursuant to a Presidential Executive Order declaring every third week of September as international coastal clean-up week. The clean-up drive will cover the stretch of the coastal area in Subic Bay from the Kalakhan River to the fringes of the Boardwalk section and will be held through the joint efforts of the Ocean Conservancy International, Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA), the Philippine Marketing Association-Zambales Chapter and the Lighthouse Marina Resort and Hotel, the eight Rotary Clubs of Zambales and the five IYFR Philippine fleets.

It can be truly said therefore that tomorrow’s happening brings about the beginning of a “sea change” actually and figuratively which according to an Ocean Conservancy write up, is a “big change coming from big places” where volunteers are “teaming up with businesses who involve their employees in beach clean-up drives and in changing practices that lead to garbage on the beaches and waterways. Together their efforts mean that the next year, they hope to pick up fewer pounds of garbage on our beaches and waterways” leading to the restoration of their health and beauty.

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