More budget for Cebu’s protected areas sought

CEBU, Philippines - The Central Cebu Protected Landscape-Protected Management Board (CCPL-PAMB) has sought the help of the Office of the Presidential Assistant for the Visayas and the National Economic and Development Authority in lobbying for the watershed management projects’ inclusion in the national budget.

The board, in yesterday’s meeting, asked OPAV and NEDA to lobby for the passage of its five-year CCPL budget plan amounting to P59 million before the Congress.

CCPL-PAMB is composed of members from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources-7, NEDA and other non-government organizations.

DENR-7 Director Dr. Emma Melana, chairman of the CCPL-PAMB, said the agency has only less than P500,000 budget allocation for CCPL, which she admitted is insufficient.

“We have budget but not enough to operate around 25,000-hectare CCPL area. The amount is very limited and we cannot do much,” she said.

The roughly half million budget is intended only for PAMB meetings and other operational expenses.

“If we have to protect CCPL then we need more money,” she said.

William Granert, executive director of the Soil and Water Conservation Foundation Inc., said in a statement that CCPL should have an appropriated budget from the national government.

“…It is a protected area that has legal mandate under the Republic Act 9487 (CCPL Act of 2007). However, there are no implementing rules and regulations (IRR) for CCPL,” he said.

The CCPL IRR, he said was supposed to be drafted within a month of the signing of RA 9487.

In 2013, a draft of the IRR was submitted to DENR central office in Manila but was only returned with corresponding “suggestions” on February 16 this year. A workshop was held on March 7 to finalize the IRR and it was sent back to the central office for approval.

Granert said an initial budget of approximately P10 million is being included in the IRR but it is set aside for the salaries of employees.

CCPL has a protected area superintendent who is the provincial environmental natural resource officer, assistant supervisor, and five organic personnel (three contractual and the rest are laborers).

However, the board said these personnel are not enough to manage and oversee the CCPL for the sustainability of the protected landscape.

The board said it is difficult to protect the CCPL with standard equipment, among others, handheld global positioning system (GPS), binoculars, VHF (signifies the very high frequency of the range) radios and vehicles not available.

A member of the board also stressed yesterday that a budget for information dissemination on CCPL must be incorporated in the budget.

Granert agreed saying that approximately half of the one million Metro Cebu residents are unaware of the importance of CCPL.

“Residents in a majority of the CCPL barangays are irresponsibly exhausting or contaminating the resources within the protected landscape,” Granert said.

“If the challenges facing CCPL are left unabated, the damage that occurs to its valuable resources may be irreversible,” he added.

Melana said they will explore other resources to get funding for the protection and management of CCPL, which are being managed to enhance biological diversity and is protected against destructive human exploitation. She also said there is a need to delineate the boundaries of protected areas.

The board has initially identified the Integrated Protected Area Fund (IPAF) and the resource user fees, for instance, generated from the Metropolitan Cebu Water District (MCWD).

Melana said the resource user fees have been a long-standing issue with MCWD, a case of which is still pending resolution before the Office of the Solicitor General.

The case stemmed from the alleged refusal of the water district to give P1 per cubic meter that they get from the watershed.

At least P16 million of revenues would have been generated from MCWD’s resource user fees.

With this, the board is also asking the OPAV to facilitate a meeting with MCWD and CCPL-PAMB.

The watersheds of CCPL comprise an area of 28,083 hectares, which are homes to 144 endemic plant species and 188 species of birds, reptiles and mammals. Several of these species are critically endangered, including the Cebu Cinnamon Tree, Cebu Flower Pecker and Cebu Goby.

The diminished forest habitat of CCPL has approximately .05 percent of the good forest cover in the 28,083 hectares. (FREEMAN)