By Armando A. Mortejo
First of Two parts
“What now remains compared with what then existed is like the skeleton of a sick man, all fat and soft earth having wasted away, and only the bare framework of the land being left… there are some mountains which have nothing but food for bees, but they had trees not very long ago, and the rafters from those felled there to roof the largest buildings are still sound.” — From Critias by Plato
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“Where have all our forests gone?” environmentalists deplore.
To glimpse the magnitude of what’s been lost, a Worldwatch Institute report recommends, imagine a time-lapse video — set on fast-forward — of earth taken from space. History passes in minutes; centuries race by in seconds. Yet human settlement and industry barely make a dent on the world’s forests — until the 19th century.
When Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan “rediscovered” the Philippines on March 16, 1592, 92% (27.5 million hectares), the country’s total land area of 30 million hectares was covered with forests. This went down to 70% (27.5 million) in 1863. By 1920, it dipped to 64% (18.9 million hectares) and finally to 36.3% (10.9 million hectares) in 1970.
Mindanao, the country’s second largest island, was not spared from denudation. In 1963, 67% (6,638,719 hectares) of its total land area of 9,868,260 hectares was covered with forests. But a report released by the Central Mindanao Agriculture Resources Research and Development Consortium in 1995 showed that only 18% of the island’s forest cover remained.
“But what’s even more alarming is that the island is losing its remaining forest cover at the rate of one hectare every three minutes,” the report said. Ideally, ecologists claim the island should have 54% forest cover to regenerate itself and be considered ecologically sound.
In 2011, during the third board meeting of the Mindanao Development Authority, members raised an alarm on the vast deforestation in Mindanao. “There is only six percent of forestry left in Mindanao. We from Mindanao must do something. And we have encouraged the local government unit to plant trees,” Luwalhati Antonino, who was then the chairperson of the said board meeting, was quoted as saying.
Even before deforestation became a huge problem in Mindanao, Harold R. Watson was already sounding the alarm. “At that time when I was telling the Filipinos that they must do something before the forests were devoid of their trees, they just laughed at me,” recalled Watson, who was the former director of the Mindanao Baptist Rural Life Center (MBRLC) based in Kinuskusan, Bansalan, Davao del Sur. “I was told, ‘We’re never going to run out of trees!”
But today, people who laughed at Watson would agree with him now. “The Philippine isles were once almost totally covered by tropical forest, leading us proudly proclaim to the whole world what while our country may not have much financial resources, we are a rich nation because of our abundant natural resources,” a former lawmaker pointed out. “But now, we’re down to 3.0% forest cover.”
In the past, forest resources helped fuel the economy of the Philippines. In the 1970s, the country was touted the prima donna among world timber exporters. Today, it is considered “a wood-pauper,” to quote the words of multi-awarded journalist Juan Mercado.
Ecological disaster
To many experts, this spells ecological disaster. In 2011, Typhoon Sendong brought 12 hours of continuous rain to Mindanao Island. Tragedy took place after that. The rivers flooded and people were crushed by logs or drowned. The government declared it “a national disaster” with the storm affecting 338,000 people in 13 provinces.
Sean McDonagh, a priest who worked in the area, said decades of deforestation in Cagayan de Oro City and nearby provinces was to blame for the scale of the disaster. Much of the region was converted from rainforest into pineapple plantations.
“The deforestation was literally criminal,” he told “The Universe Catholic Weekly.” “If the rainforest in the area had been left intact, even 12 hours of continuous rain would not cause this devastation. The rainforest canopy would stop the torrential rain from hitting the ground directly. Trees would also absorb the water.”
Who should be blamed for the rapid disappearance of the country’s forest cover? There’s no single individual can be considered the culprit but there’s a group of them. For one, loggers are on the top of the list.
The Rev. Peter Walpole, executive director of the Ateneo de Manila University’s Environmental Science for Social Change, said the Philippines “trusted” logging companies to cut down trees and manage the forest. “But they did a very bad job,” he decried. “That started the problem that we have now.”
Logging became rampant during the presidency of Ferdinand Marcos. “As the timber boom gained momentum, the government was unable to supervise concessions effectively or enforce logging regulations,” wrote Robert Repetto, author of “The Forest for the Trees? Government Policies and the Misuse of Forest Resources.” “Links between timber companies and politicians further eroded government control.”
In 1989, the government imposed a lumber export ban in an effort to save the country’s forests from uncontrolled illegal logging. The following year, the ban was quietly lifted, but was reinstated after loud criticism.
Other culprits
In recent years, forest fires have been cited as another cause of deforestation in the country. From 1978 to 1996, forest fires destroyed approximately 304,345 hectares — or an average of 16,000 hectares per year. From 1992 to 1996, fire damage was estimated at P465 million.
Other causes of deforestation in the Philippines are “kaingin” farming (slash-and-burn agriculture) and mining operations. Volcanic eruptions and strong typhoons have also devastated some of the country’s tropical rainforests.
Most of the remaining forest covers are located in ecologically-fragile uplands. And these areas are not spared from denudation. As population continues to grow in the lowlands, people are now migrating to the uplands.
