BORACAY, hopefully, should be the last tourism spot to suffer from environmental degradation. Others should learn from the mistakes that made it a – in the words of President Rodrigo Duterte – cesspool. The truth is that main problem in Boracay is the weak enforcement of and non-compliance in the country’s environmental laws. And this is not unique to Boracay.
The buck actually stops with concerned government agencies and local government units. They must step up in enforcing our laws.
But people and businesses, too, have a big role to play to preserve tourist spots like Boracay. We should not use our islands, seas, bays and rivers as sewerage or garbage bins. We should not build on protected areas or encroach critical biodiversity areas; instead, we must preserve our wetlands and forestlands, which ensure the balance of our ecosystem.
If we simply comply with environmental laws, especially the Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, and the Ecological Solid Waste Management (ESWM) Law, we would not have to be here. The implementation of the ESWM law will address solid waste disposal issues.
Specifically for Boracay, it must have functioning sewerage and septage systems. Figures from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources show around 7.5 million liters of wastewater is generated in Boracay every day but only about half is treated properly, while the other half is discharged untreated. About 30 to 40 percent of the untreated wastewater comes from private homes, and the rest from business establishments.
If we comply with environmental laws we would not have to deal with the problems Boracay is now suffering.
