THE GOVERNMENT reports that the Philippines is losing approximately 47,000 hectares of forest cover every year. In 2003, the country’s forests comprised 7.2 million hectares but in 2010 it went down to about 6.8 million hectares which are about a 4.6 percent decline. The country is down to less than 24 percent of the original forest cover in the 1900s.
Mass poverty is the result of the greed of the ruling political dynasty of the area and their cronies in the multinational corporations. The people, deprived of land, go hungry and migrate to the city slums of Manila to eke out a precarious survival. There, they huddle together in the shadow of the giant towers of condos of the one percent that make up the super-rich. Corrupt officials are allowing it to happen.
These corrupt political and economic forces that cause poverty and provide a great pool of low-cost labor for the rich to exploit should be held accountable. These same forces are damaging the environment around the globe and in Southeast Asia, including the Philippines. All nations are suffering a loss of their biodiversity.
Once the natural habitat is damaged, the animals, birds, reptiles and insects die out. The spraying of pesticides further advances the destruction of life on earth. Kill the insects and the food of millions of birds is diminished and some will soon be extinct.
Allow an invasive species into a nation and disaster to natural wildlife follows. In the Philippines, the golden snail caused the extinction of native apple snails. They poisoned fishponds with their toxicity, killing the fish fingerlings and they attacked rice fields destroying the crops. It is a real environmental disaster.
A government report from the National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan, 2002), says “The Philippines is considered as one of the world’s “biodiversity hotspot” with at least 700 threatened species thus making it one of the top global conservation areas. Based on reports of the number of illegal wildlife trade, the country’s ports have been a hub for Illegal wildlife trading. The Philippines also has the highest number of threatened species per unit area in the world”.
We can change things around by demanding accountability from the government bureaus in charge of the natural resources, the department of agriculture, and forest management. The people can demand that they preserve and not destroy. We can show children videos like the Blue Planet by David Atthenbourgh. Teach the children to love nature.
We can plant trees, create a fenced-off area in our gardens and farms to allow wildlife to thrive. We can support environmental NGOs saving the damaged environment. We can be good stewards and protectors of biodiversity and the natural world. (preda.org)/PN
