TWO of the country’s top environmentalists and climate change experts reminded local town/city mayors on the downside of tourism and other development pursuits.
Jose Maria Lorenzo Tan, chief executive officer of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)-Philippines, cited the experience of the tourism industry in Baguio City which may happen in the Island Garden City of Samal (IGaCoS) and Davao City
Tan said tourism was the anchor of Baguio’s development for 50 years. However, recent economic data show that tourism in the summer capital is on the decline.
Baguio kept building hotels like the cities of Cebu and Iloilo. However, while occupancy rate in Cebu and Iloilo increased from 60 to 70 percent, the one in Baguio dropped from 40 to 35 and then 30 percent, he said.
“What is growing in Baguio is educational enrolment. It’s becoming a talent center. So all these hotels designed for tourists are actually more than half empty now,”Tan told the mayors and local government development planners attending the conference at Grand Menseng Hotel Friday as a culminating activity of the Davao Gulf Week.
“There is a proliferation of unregistered home stays in Baguio. People build houses for rent, they don’t pay taxes, they don’t issue receipts, so the city government does not get anything from the industry,” he said.
“We’re telling you this, so that you’ll know that since this is already happening in other places; it may happen in IGaCoS and Davao City,” Tan added.
The conference was attended by mayors from six cities and 18 towns of four provinces that ring the Davao Gulf.
Tan said tourism maybe good for now. “But when we start the tourism program, we should always think about what will happen later because everything ends. You start and you end.”
Impact
In planning tourism and other development thrusts, Presidential assistant on climate change Elisea “Bebet” Gozun also cautioned the mayors to brace against the impact of climate change, including excessive rainfall, flooding, and extreme temperatures.
Based on the patterns of temperature, she said Northeastern Mindanao is getting hotter now and by 2025, “it will be the entire Mindanao.”
“The hottest part in terms of temperature in the country is Mindanao,”according to Gozun who served as secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources during the Joseph Estrada presidency.
The country being an archipelago, she warned local governments, particularly in the coastal areas, against the implications of the gradual rise of seawater levels that “will eventually reduce the area of our wetlands and other low-lying areas.”
“Kaunon sa dagat ang atong yuta. It will erode the beaches. Ma-cover sa dagat ang atong beaches. Sa tourism dako ni ug impact kay angbulk sa atong tourism attraction is really coastal. Coastal tourism ning atoa tungod sa atong mga beaches,” she said.
Mining and migration
In the case of mining, Tan said the mining companies must take into account the impact of their operations on the communities.
“I told the chamber of mines that from day one, from the day you start, you should begin talking with the communities and identify what will be the sources of their livelihood 20 years, 30 years down the line.”
Tan said that farm areas and water sources must be spared from mining and other related forms of development.
“If the soil is damaged, the famers can no longer plant after (the mining companies) leave.
“I told the chamber that you must not touch water areas. It’s not enough to plant trees so that you can recharge your aquifer. You must make sure that the water, the recharge is actually delivered to the communities who need it and the oversupply of water that causes floods and death is managed so that communities are not marginalized and driven out of their homes,” he added.
Tan cautioned the mayors against the impact of migration.
“One of the greatest threats that we have seen here in Davao is your having no typhoons,” he said. It is because it will attract inmigration. People will move here,” he said, adding that in the cities of Cebu, Iloilo and Baguio, the local governments are complaining about the difficulty of managing migration.
“These are things that local governments have to think about. That’s something which will happen. We are seeing it already. It all started here in Davao,” he said.
Climate change
Tan said there is a need for local governments to look into the “hazards that will result from climate change. “We must look at the probability that the city or municipality will face those hazards. When we realize that, we must look at the adaptive capability of the city or municipality–your labor force, educational level, savings and economic factors that will help you decide what is the rating of the city in terms of its capacity to adapt economically, to climate change,” he said.
Tan added that it would be to the advantage of each LGU to assess its own capability and compare with other counterparts.
“So you’re not only looking at yourself. You will discover what the other cities are doing, what other towns are doing and learn from that,” he said.
Gozun said that one worrisome fact about Davao City is rise of seawater level which will further push the freshwater level upwards.
The former cabinet official said that during the time she was residing in Davao City, Toril was famous for free-flowing drinking water from the aquifer.
“This is no longer the case today, when people are extracting more water than what nature can recharge or replace,” Gozun, who is a relative of the Almendrases, warned.
She also advised local planners to look into the growing problem of urban sprawl due to the fast expansion of areas being converted into housing subdivisions. She said urban sprawl causes increased motorization, air pollution, diseases and other problems. [GREG DELIGERO]
