AS I understand it, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) has jurisdiction over mangrove trees, and not the Department of Agriculture (DA).
That is probably due to their understanding that mangroves do not produce fruits and are therefore not part of food security targets. It therefore goes without saying that all trees that do not produce fruits or do not have edible portions are also not part of food security.
If that is the case, then both the DENR and the DA would need to come up with a database that will show which is which.
Just to be clear, wildlife could mean both flora and fauna and, in that sense, mangrove trees are generally part of wildlife, although there are already mangrove forests that are artificially or commercially planted.
Although mangrove trees do not directly produce food, these trees are the reason why more fish, crabs and shrimps are harvested where they grow.
My purpose in writing this is to encourage all concerned national government agencies (NGAs) and local government units (LGUs) to work together more and coordinate more in protecting our wildlife, especially when there are overlaps in jurisdictions and whenever it is not clear who does what.
Rather than allow grey areas in jurisdictions to cause confusion as to who does what, I suggest that the LGUs should take the lead, with the Biodiversity Management Bureau (BMB) of the DENR and the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) of the DA providing the supports, possibly with the assistance of the Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) under DA.
GAINING GROUND AGAINST INVASIVE SPECIES
The good news is, the BFAR is somehow gaining ground in the battle against invasive species. The bad news is, the fight seems to be focused only in Laguna de Bay, and there are no key performance indicators (KPIs) that could tell us whether we are really winning the war or not.
In fairness to BFAR however, it seems that no one really knows the actual numbers about the populations of invasive that are out there in our lakes and rivers, perhaps not even BFAR itself. Whatever the numbers are, it would be best to have some estimates at least, so that we would know whether we are really meeting our objectives or not.
Ideally, the BFAR tell us their target numbers per species that they are tasked to eradicate. Better still, there should be a timeline or a deadline as to when the extermination would end, for all invasive species such as janitor fish, knife fish, Midas chichlids, softshell turtles, blackchin tilapia and flowerhorns. There could be others, but the data is hard to come by.
BFAR is not giving up on the fight, and they have formed task forces that involve other national government agencies (NGAs) and LGUs to join in the war against invasive species. While it is good to see that the LGUs are eager to help, I think it would be best if they take the lead in their own jurisdictions, and just let the BFAR and the other NGAs to provide the necessary supports.
And they should bring the war to the whole country, not just Laguna de Bay./PN
