InterAksyon.com
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MANILA, Philippines -- Over 50 organizations, including fisherfolk, marine scientists and environmental lawyers, on Thursday called for a 10-year moratorium on all reclamation projects and a thorough review of existing projects.
The participants to the People’s Summit on the Impacts of Reclamation said such projects can “potentially result in the decrease of productivity and biodiversity, disruption of vital ecosystem functions, increased vulnerability to floods, and the displacement and dislocation of thousands of families dependent on the affected environments for their livelihood.”
The findings were based on various independent and scientific studies in places as diverse as Panglao in Bohol, Cordova in Cebu and Manila Bay.
“President Benigno Aquino (III) and the PRA (Philippine Reclamation Authority) should listen to the demand of the people to carry out an across-the-country moratorium on land reclamation and allow a thoroughgoing review of all reclamation projects and their impacts over the last five decades,” Leon Dulce, spokesman of the Kalikasan party-list, said.
Dulce added that the situation in areas covered by reclamation projects “merits an urgent and unconditional moratorium.”
The moratorium on the National Reclamation Plan and all other projects outside the plan will provide ample time for a rigorous scientific and participatory assessment of the ecological and socioeconomic impacts, the groups said.
“The country consistently ranked the third most vulnerable country in the world to disasters. Implementing the NRP exposes our people to grave dangers and degrades further the severely degraded environment,” they said.
They also decried the lack of consultation in the implementation of the NRP, which they say violates the right of citizens to participate in making decisions on matters affecting them.
The Summit participants challenged the PRA and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to immediately cancel projects being opposed by affected residents as well as for those assessed to have adverse effects on the environment and on communities.
Kalikasan, quoting the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, described reclamation “as perhaps the most irreversible form of environmental degradation, resulting to biomass loss.”
Reclamation, they said, causes immediate and severe ecological and socio-economic impacts such as coastal community and fisherfolk displacement and destruction of ecosystems.
The Summit also encouraged government actors to “rethink and reformulate programs and policies on the management of our coastal and marine resources, particularly on reclamation, in accordance with environmental and other relevant laws.”
“We must support and promote alternative and strategically viable coastal management and other development practices that will ensure maximum and accessible benefits to the people and the environment. We must also be at the forefront of supporting and promoting alternative coastal management and practices,” they said.
The Summit was organized by the Center for Environmental Concerns-Philippines, PAMALAKAYA Pilipinas, Institute of Environmental Science and Meteorology in UP Diliman, Kalikasan People’s Network for the Environment, Alliance for Stewardship and Authentic Progress, Kalikasan party-list, Advocates of Science & Technology for the People (AGHAM), Philippine Earth Justice Center and the Central Visayas Fisherfolk Development Center, Inc.
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