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PO-The President.

Senator Villar. …trade syndicates to previously remote areas, while the internet

gave unprecedented access to new markets.

The two-decade-old Wildlife Act must be strengthened to address the growing

scale of sophistication of wildlife crimes. There is a need to develop a more stringent

legal framework, improved enforcement mechanism, and strengthened inter-agency

cooperation against illegal wildlife trade. We need to give more teeth, so to speak, to

existing policies and laws to help law-enforcement authority to apprehend violators.

And that is what Senate Bill No. 2465 seeks to provide—to fortify the mechanism in

place to afford better protection to our wildlife resources.

Senate Bill No. 2465, or the Revised Wildlife Resources Conservation and

Protection Bill, which I am sponsoring now, will provide the timely or relevant

amendments to RA 9047. This includes the following, among others: it addresses

the crime of wildlife trafficking by providing its definition and commensurate

penalties and other strategies to defer the devious schemes of wildlife syndicates that

are large-scale and transnational; it includes control and management mechanism

for invasive alien species that threatens the survival of our local plants and animals;

it provides guidelines on the collection, possession, and transport of wildlife, its by-

products and derivative; it recognizes the jurisdiction of the Palawan Council for

Sustainable Development and the Bangsamoro Government over wildlife species in

their respective territories; the DENR, Department of Agriculture, Palawan Council

for Sustainable Development, and the Bangsamoro Government, as applicable, are

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given the power to exercise administrative adjudication in cases of violations and may

cause the confiscation, forfeiture, and final disposition of wildlife, its by-products,

and derivatives as well as tools and conveyances; it provides increase in penalty for

illegal acts to serve as a deterrent for the commission of wildlife crimes, and there are

provisions on the applicability of the disputable presumption that wildlife offenses

have been committed.

Strengthening wildlife protection is crucial to the Philippines which is considered

as one of the world’s 17 mega-diverse or bio-diversity rich countries which collectively

host 2/3 of the earth’s bio-diversity and contain about 70% to 80% of the world’s

plant and animals species.

The Philippines harbors one of the highest concentration of unique wildlife

species in the world, yet it is also a bio-diversity hotspots, with high levels of threats

from habitat loss, invasive alien species, climate change, pollution, and over-

exploitation. Thus, this calls for us to take action on the protection of our wildlife

because any damage or loss will cost too much for all of us.

We owe it to the future generation to conserve and protect our wildlife resources.

It is part of our duty to leave this world better than we found it.

Let us make sure that the future generation will still actually encounter and

coexist with an abundance of plants and animals and not just see them in old

pictures.

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In closing, Mr. President, esteemed colleague, I earnestly seek your support for

the swift passage of the Revised Wildlife Resources Conservation and Protection Bill.

Thank you, at isang maka-kalikasang hapon sa inyong lahat.

Maraming salamat po.

Senator Villanueva. Thank you, Senator villar.

SUSPENSION OF CONSIDERATION OF S. NO. 2465

Mr. President, to allow our colleagues to review further the said measure, I move

that we suspend consideration of Senate Bill No. 2465 under Committee Report No.

402.

The President. Is there any objection? [Silence] There being none, the motion

is approved.

Senator Villanueva. Mr. President, Sen. Ramon Bong Revilla Jr. would like to

insert, for the record, his sponsorship speech as principal author of Senate Bill No.

2464 under Committee Report No. 401…