It is emerging as major culprit behind disaster that killed over 1,200
Alastair McIndoe Straits Times 31 Dec 11;
MANILA: Logging is emerging as a major culprit behind the flood disaster that killed at least 1,257 people in the southern Philippines.
In a country highly prone to natural disasters, the loss of vast areas of protective forest cover in uplands and watersheds has long put communities at risk from flash floods and landslides triggered by pounding seasonal rains.
In the aftermath of the catastrophic floods in two coastal cities on Mindanao island on Dec 17, a nationwide logging ban ordered by President Benigno Aquino 11 months ago to help prevent such disasters from recurring is under the spotlight.
Environment officials admitted this week that the logging ban had not been enforced in a politically volatile part of Mindanao that has been hard to govern.
An investigation is now under way to determine whether ongoing logging there contributed to the flood damage unleashed by tropical storm Washi.
But the region already has some of the country's most depleted forests, said Forest Management Bureau assistant director Nonito Tamayo.
Aerial footage of Ligan City's shoreline taken days after the storm shows a thick carpet of logs and other debris washed down from swollen river systems.
Officials believe the logs came from nearby Lanao del Sur province in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). The logging ban was ignored because the four-million population in ARMM had its own environmental authority.
'That was the problem,' Environment Secretary Ramon Paje told the Philippine Daily Inquirer. 'When the President declared a total log ban, they were not sold on the idea. So logging in the ARMM was allowed and above that, there was illegal logging.'
President Aquino has ordered ARMM governor Mujiv Hataman - who has been just days in the job - to enforce the ban and crack down on illegal logging.
It is a tough assignment. This corner of the Philippines has a notorious reputation for lawlessness - a legacy of decades of insurgency, warlordism and a high incidence of poverty.
And because of security concerns, the ARMM still has not been fully mapped for geo-hazards, said the government's geological survey chief Sevillo David.
All the same, its new governor swiftly sacked a senior environment officer - and has said that more heads will roll - after uncovering evidence of continued logging in a sensitive watershed area feeding Mindanao's main river system.
Government data shows the ARMM has only around 250,000ha of forest cover left. 'That's small considering the size of the region,' said Mr Tamayo.
The national picture is just as bleak.
Decades of rampant logging - and often illegal - have reduced the country's natural forest cover from 80 per cent at the turn of the 20th century to 24 per cent today, leaving just over 7 million ha of forest. The perils of tree-thin uplands were devastatingly exposed in 1991 by flash floods which killed more than 6,000 people in the central Philippine city of Ormoc. The debris flushed down a mountainside included hundreds of logs and shipping containers of cut timber.
After years of ineffective campaigns against illegal logging, there are some signs that the government's logging ban is not merely another exercise in good intentions but with weak implementation.
According to the environment department, 450 cases of illegal logging have been brought to court since the ban, and there have been 72 convictions. Mr Paje said that turning the President's executive order into legislation would give the logging ban 'more teeth' and ensure that it remains in force after his term in office.
The only legal sources of timber are now from commercial plantations, which cover 330,000ha, and imports. Senator Loren Legarda, an environmental crusader, wants the logging ban to last 25 years.
The administration also plans to plant 1.6 billion indigenous trees on 1.5 million ha of forest-depleted land between this year and 2016. Under the programme, 100,000ha was targeted for this year, which Mr Tamayo says was met.
The goal for next year is 200,000ha, and 300,000ha for each of the following three years.
Among those helping are the nation's schoolchildren. Those in state education are each required to plant 10 seedlings a year. Mining firms must plant 100 trees for every one they displace.
As for the logs recovered from Washi's disaster zone, they will be used to repair damaged schools. Classes resume on Jan 3 and in the city of Cagayan de Oro alone, some 406 classrooms need repairing.
