No more logging without reforestation!

For our guests and topic on our talkshow Straight from the Sky, we bring you a healthy exchange between the Private Sector Representatives (PSR) of the Regional Development Council in the CALABARZON or Region IV-A led by its RDC chairman, the dynamic Richard Albert Osmond and Batangas Tourism Council chairman Atty. Apolinario Macalintal and the RDC-7's PSR counterparts in Region VII led by RDC-7 co-chairman Robert Go.

We met with the CALABARZON PSR officials last Thursday at the NEDA Conference room and it was quite healthy to meet our PSR counterparts from one of the nation's most promising economic growth center. If the RDC in Region VII has been very successful, it is also due to the active participation of the private sector reps. During the Martial Law years, the RDC was already in place, except that the private sector was not included in the economic plans for the country. This changed after the EDSA revolt and if you see an RDC led by a private sector rep, you can bet that it doesn't care about politics, but business. So see them tonight on SkyCable's channel 15 at 8:00 p.m.

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I'm not surprised to hear that there has been a massive outpouring of support from people all over the country, including the United Nations and the United States on the disaster that happened to Guinsaugon, St. Bernard, Southern Leyte last Friday. After all, this disaster was very well documented by BBC World. But from the way things are going... the search and rescue efforts is turning into search and recovery because unlike an earthquake where people can be trapped inside a broken building and often last for several days, in this case most of the victims were buried in a mud avalanche.

From the way things are developing... even the arrival of the US Navy's 7th Fleet, the USS Harpers Ferry and the USS Essex might be too late. Perhaps now would be a good time to find out whether Barangay Guinsaugon can be rebuilt where it once stood. We have heard that before this disaster struck, St. Bernard and most of Southern Leyte was drenched in more than 500 millimeters of rain for two whole weeks against its average rainfall of only 137 millimeters a month, thus turning this mountain into a huge mud cake waiting to slide down... and slide down it did!

I gathered from the Internet that some 20 years ago, geomorphologist Dr. Ricarte S. Javelosa mapped the area including St. Bernard and found out that this was an active mass movement zone... and old landslide area. Since this area was totally denuded by loggers, nothing could prevent the mud from sliding down to the plain. The problem then was, who would believe Dr. Javelosa if he insisted that the people living there should vacate their homes because of a potential landslide? So the big question is, will this disaster happen again? That is something for scientists like Dr. Javelosa to find out.

In the meantime, there is no point in rebuilding what's left of Bo. Guinsaugon on where it used to stand simply because that area needs to be thoroughly searched for missing residents. What is of equal importance if you ask me is for the Arroyo administration to look at the other places in this country that could be in similar peril... so that its residents can be alerted this early. That's the least that the super task force that Pres. Arroyo formed for this disaster can do. A few years ago, a similar mudslide struck Bo. San Ricardo in Panaon Island, just a few kilometers from St. Bernard.

Meanwhile, I would like to believe that the massive donation of food and clothing from all over the Philippines are not going to be needed because the survivors number only less than two hundred. What they probably need is building materials to rebuild their homes somewhere.

As always, whenever a disaster like the Ormoc tragedy happens, all fingers point to that faceless illegal logger and I dare say, even the legal ones. The political opposition led by Sen. Aquilino Pimentel, Jr. was quick to blame the wrong policies of the Arroyo Administration. But in truth, illegal and legal loggers had a heyday for decades in the various islands of this archipelago and I tell you... most of those who had logging businesses got their permits from their political friends.

Most of these loggers live in the plush subdivisions in Metro Manila living luxurious lifestyles, while leaving the poor people in the area where they destroyed the forest open to environmental disasters like what happened in Leyte. I would like to emphasize that our economy requires wood for furniture and construction. But I would like to see an end to logging without reforestation. Meaning, loggers who replanted where they cut trees should be responsible for the growth of those trees for the next ten years. That would assure us that where the trees have been cut, trees could once again grow.

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