Garcia, Dan Drexter Z.

NASC 10 U
2014-21141 BS EE CEAT November 17, 2016

Forest Conservation through Collective and Individual Works

The book The Politics of Logging: Power from the Forest discussed the disastrous effects
of excessive logging, wherein it involves flooding that destroyed thousands of households and
businesses. It also showed various happenings in the Philippine Forest and political interventions
of the government—from creating laws, orders, and up to regulations--which later on promoted
or harmed our forest. Through this book, I became more aware n what has happened in our forest
and figured out the mistakes our predecessors have committed.
Irresponsible logging could really be deadly. An example of it is the Ormoc City tragedy,
in which 4,000 people were killed by the Typhoon Uring’s floodwaters and 2.000 more were left
missing. It could be taken into account that the entire city, by the time of calamity, was only 10%
forested. Knowing that trees help the soil absorb flood waters, if only the majority of the forest
cover is conserved in those days, misfortunes such as this will be prevented. With this, I am one
with the people of Ormoc City in calling for reforestation in order for these adversities not to
happen again.
There are different phases of forest development done in the country. First is the forest
development in colonization era. In the time of Spanish occupation, the timbers produced were
used to construct a service ships, which could be used in the galleon trade between Spain,
Mexico, and other countries. Meanwhile, in American occupation, lumber companies with
advance lumber mills was built in order to gather high-quality woods, especially Philippine
mahogany. Also, in 1910, the School of Forestry at UPLB was established to educate students
about the colonizer’s ideas of logging. During the time of occupation, a significant percentage of
forest cover was diminished, with the colonizers and private companies as major players. As
declared in the book, from about 27.5 million hectares of land by 1575, it became 17 million
hectares in 1934. On the other hand, because of the School of Forestry, Filipinos were introduced
to a new, modern, and sustainable way of logging.
In the early post-war era, there were lesser restrictions and regulations implemented
concerning the utilization of the forest. It might had happened because at that time, forest cover
in our country is still large in size and the more important concerns to be addressed by the then
young Republic is the rehabilitation of the devastated infrastructures and construction of houses
for the poor. In the book, at the time of President Quirino and Magsaysay, some of the forests
lands were converted into agricultural lands and resettlements. A program titled “Land for
landless” was conducted to provide land to the farmers. To some extent, forest lands were
cleared for this purpose. These actions done by the government were somehow agreeable for me,
but with some reservations. If there were a great number of hectares of forest land converted,
then I will definitely go against them, because those deeds defeat the very goal of their own
program—sustainable development. Yes, there will be land for the poor farmers to plow which
could bring economic development to them but if the exchange of it is overexploitation of our
natural resources, then it will be another story.
 The major players in the post-war era phase of forest development were the government,
farmers, and the people who purchased converted forest lands. The government explored forests
and even the virgin ones, then encouraged the poor people to settle there or converted those to
agricultural land. Meanwhile, the elite people, who purchased the converted lands, used the
property for plantations. Truthfully, the forest reserve of our country decreased as these players
intervened.
In the span of 21 years in the office, President Marcos appeared to use his power to favor
those who were related and close to him. Using the Timber License Agreement (TLA) as a bait
for big-mouthed politicians, cronies, and private companies, he maintained their support for his
administration. In return, those companies were allowed to log and to overexploit the forest.
Even though there were laws concerning the exploitation of the forest, the massive corruption in
the late president’s term became a way for his cronies to abuse and not to follow the written
rules. As an example, his friend Alfonso Lim presided more than 600,000 hectares of forest land
for logging, which was against the law, wherein only 100,000 ha or less of the forest land should
be under the control of an individual or corporation.
Personal gain is their major goal and not sustainable development. To cite an example,
Sta. Ines Melale Forest Products Inc. (SIMF) easily got their license permit to operate renewed in
1983 despite the numerous evidences that the company is not reforesting. Its owner, the Cuencas,
are Marco’s close friends. Even the then-Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile was caught
exporting logs above the limit stated in the law. His 12 logging and one trade companies were
involved in such corruption. In these phase of forest development, the key players were the
Marcos administration and his cronies. Their two-way relationships highly degraded the forest
reserve in the country. Also, selective logging was not implemented but clearcutting, placing the
forest in danger of being completely destroyed.
Another phase of forest development was at the time of President Cory and beyond. In
the time when Maceda served as Cory’s DENR secretary, it first appeared that he was against
corruption but indeed, he was involved in it. Though he has suspended different TLAs, on the
other hand, he issued stumpage contracts which has a “cut-and-go” mindset. Also, those
companies which have no experience in logging were granted such contract. As a result, forest
denudation happened. Clearly, Maceda was a traditional politician who used to have two faces—
one is for good publicity and the other one is for corruption. Meanwhile, the PCGG sequestered
some of the logging companies owned by Marcos’s allies, which definitely paused the
deforestation in the areas where the companies were operating.
The people in Ginoog City in Northern Mindanao sought to halt the logging operations of
MIDC due to continuous logging in an over-logged area, cutting undersized logs, and not
reforesting. This came to the ears of the then DENR Secretary Factoran and after some
investigation, they found out that the company was guilty of such. Thus, they cancelled MIDC’s
TLA. But a year later, Executive Secretary Drillon restored MIDC’s license. From here,
corruption was still occurring in the government. There were sufficing-enough evidences to fully
stop the logging operation of the company but still, Drillon decided to allow it again. At the end
of the day, those things such as corruption will bring no glory to us humans but destruction. That
is why we should be really careful in whom we will be agreed to lead our country because the
sake of our future goes into their hands.
After the Senate restoration in the late 90’s, they [the senators] began to talk about the
massive denudation of the forest happened during the time of Marcos. At first, some senators
likened the total log ban for several number of years in the reason of forest recovery. But in
1991, the Senate approved the commercial logging ban for 30 years.
Total logging ban, for me, includes many implications. First, the economic trade-offs of
such decision has a big impact to our country. The employees working in the logging industry
will be unemployed if this bill was passed into law and those numbers will be added to the
continuously inflating number of unemployed people here in our country. Also, the earnings
from those industries will also be gone, which will lower our gross domestic product and lessen
the tax revenues of the government. Second, the environmental trade-offs. There is no assurance
that if you impose a total logging ban, there will be completely no logging happened and that
kind of thinking is barely ideal. Moreover, there are certain logging companies who obey the
rules set by the law and protect the forest in falling into more disastrous situation—small scale
and irresponsible illegal loggers and kaingeros. The illegal loggers are reckless in harvesting
wood, cutting undersized trees and doing clearcutting; kaingeros are the ones to blame for
complete deforestation, because the trees remaining in a forest after logging were burned and
turned into charcoal, thus leaving the land unfertile and empty.
I am alongside with the selective logging idea of the College of Forestry here in UPLB
and the then-Senator Mercado. The most important thing that should be considered in such
logging technique is the being responsible of the companies. Given that the companies will be
responsible, sustainable logging could be attained. An example for this is the Surigao
Development Corporation, which follows the standards provided by the DENR. Unfortunately,
because of the EO 23 issued by President Noynoy Aquino, their operation was put into full stop.
With this action done by the administration, the forest became more vulnerable to denudation
because small-scale loggers are now almost free to harvest wood from it, considering that there
will be no security guards that will halt them when doing clearcutting.
Well, selective logging is a good choice, wherein you will harvest wood in a time interval
and afterwards, planting seedlings again. This process is not that different from the agricultural
one, where we plant, harvest, and replant. If we’re almost perfectly doing such process in
agriculture, then why should we not apply it in the forest? What will be the point of the total
logging ban if there is this idea of sustainable logging?
The military and rebel groups also played roles in forestry development. The Fort
Magsaysay in Central Luzon holds some number of hectares of forest. While our army use the
forest as a training ground for the preparation in various military operations, some private
companies promised the them to build a road connection to the adjacent towns and roads inside
the forest for better military experience with a single request—allow them to log in the forest
reserve in the camp. I don’t know how this proposal slipped-off the signatures of the military
officials there. Also, I agreed in the idea of some arguer stated in the book that building roads in
the forest does not enhance the military experience but in fact decrease it because I think there’s
really no roads in the forest where the rebels camp.
Leftists such as NPA and NDF had done, somehow, forest conservation. Through the
Operation Lapat launched by the NPA, which prohibits commercial logging companies within a
25-year period in certain parts of the forest where the rebel group operates, they somehow help
for the forest protection. This might not be wholly in accordance to forest preservation but
majority because of military purposes, its effect is almost the same as of forest preservation. On
the other hand, it may be taken into account that most of them collect revolutionary taxes from
the logging companies to support their military actions. With this, some companies might be
pushed to over-log just to meet their desired profit plus the payments the rebels required.
Indigenous people have also a say in forest protection and at some point, denudation.
Some indigenous people protect their ancestral forest lands by obstructing private companies to
harvest wood from it. Today, our law empowered the indigenous people and gave them the
authority to manage their own ancestral domains. However, some indigenous people also
contribute to deforestation. Due to lack of money and knowledge about forestry, and also no
work available in the uplands other than harvesting forest products, some of them overexploit the
forest. They might do clearcutting, underage wood harvesting, and the likes. These activities are
the major contributors to deforestation.
A learner’s duty is to impart to others the knowledge he has acquired and to live with
those lessons as a guide. In connection to that, I, being a NASC 10 and UPLB student, would
live with the virtues and lessons I have acquired and would share unto others those newly-gained
ideas. I will be promoting to my family and fellow youths the importance of forest conservation
and will be leading them in working to take care of it. I will also be responsible in using every
product derived from the forest, maximizing its utilization to make sure that there will be no
wasted resources. Moreover, I will be observing and doing the three R’s—reduce, reuse and
recycle—which could minimize my consumption of such product and lessen my expenses from
buying it. Furthermore, I will actively participate in the various activities which aims to preserve
the nature.
We are the ones in-charge in making decisions on how we will utilize our natural
resources. Whatever that decision may be, there will only be two effects on us—either benefited
or harmed. The dark past experiences and faults should be now guiding us on the things that we
do, thus letting us less prone to error. On the other hand, collective efforts are the ones needed
for forest conservation. We should act as one in working for its preservation because we and our
children will be the one to use and consume it in the future. If we will be lacked of efforts in
doing such, after some time, I could imagine a country with vast agricultural land, yet no single
forest. Thus, we should be campaigning for it, for forest is a shelter, a food and material
provider, and life.