Ifugaos seek exemption from total log ban

KIANGAN,  Ifugao  - Ifugao woodcarvers are appealing to the Philippine Congress through Rep. Teodoro Baguilat Jr. to ask the president to exempt the province from the total log ban.

Hungduan town woodcarver Lopez Nauyac said the total log ban will deprive them of their living.

Nauyac warned that the woodcarving industry will die if total log ban will also be  implemented in their area.

He said Ifugaos have been practising the indigenous “muyong” (forest) system, a time-tested ecologically-friendly resource utilization and forest management scheme, which has prevented rampant logging in the province.

“Muyong” promotes selective cutting of trees and planting trees for every tree cut.

Banaue woodcarver Juanita Bognot, meanwhile, added that woodcarving has generated jobs in their community.

“We employ people  [and they use the money they earn] to send their children to school and buy food for their family,” Bognot said.

If the DENR bars them from transporting their products to Manila and other parts of the country, she said, they  would have to  let their employees go.

Since President Aquino signed Executive Order No. 23, which imposed total log ban in the country, the number of illegal logging hot spots “from Apayao to Cotabato” dropped from 197 to 28.

Amid such demands of woodcarvers and indigenous peoples depending on tree cutting for livelihood,  the DENR is now studying their request.

A new directive, supposedly exempting IPs from the log ban but under strict government monitoring, has not been issued though. - Artemio Dumlao