President Aquino OKs Executive Order on mining

President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III has issued a new executive order aimed to strengthen the enforcement of environmental laws on mining.

Under the EO, the government has six months to develop “a national program and road-map, based on the Philippine Development Plan and a National Industrialization Plan, for the development of value-adding activities and downstream industries for strategic metallic ores.”
In the Executive Order No.79 released by Malacanang on Monday, the Department of Environment and National Resources “shall ensure that environmental standards in mining, as prescribed by the various mining and environmental laws, rules, and regulations, shall be fully and strictly enforced, and appropriate sanctions meted out against violators thereof.”
The order also identifies areas where mining will not be allowed such as areas under the National Tourism Development Plan, critical areas and island eco-systems, as well as agricultural and fisheries development zones.
According to a briefer from the office of Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr., no new permits will be granted for mining in Palawan.
“The ecological uniqueness of Palawan’s flora and fauna and the need to protect the same is recognized,” the Office of the Executive Secretary said.
Although existing mining operations will be allowed to continue, Congress must pass a law “rationalizing existing revenue sharing schemes and mechanisms” before any new mining agreement is granted, the EO said.
“The DENR may continue to grant and issue Exploration Permits under existing laws, rules, and guidelines. The grantees of such permits shall have the rights under the said laws, rules, and guidelines over the approved exploration area,” the EO said.
Grantees of the permits will also have the first option to develop the site as soon as Congress passes a law for revenue sharing.

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Kadayawan, SMI, Blaans and children’s education

We find it timely to write about Indigenous People  because Davao City is celebrating next month the Kadayawan Festival, the festival of thanksgiving for bountiful harvest and in honor of the city’s tribal communities, their customs and tradition.

While the Kadayawan, like other Philippine festivals, has been invaded by the virus of commercialism, it is worthy to note that its original indigenous concept has remained. The Hiyas ng Kadayawan (Festival Gem) search, for example, has limited contestants to girls with indigenous and Muslim roots.

Kadayawan, and other festivals anchored on concepts on the indigenous, however, should not be viewed as a mere celebration for IP (lumad) culture and tradition. Its spirit should extend beyond—to year-round concerns for lumad welfare, particularly education. Not only in Davao but elsewhere.

In South Cotabato indigenous people are hoping for President Aquino’s intercession in resolving the issues preventing them from benefiting from mining investments in the area after the provincial board enacted an environment code disallowing open pit mining. Tribal communities see the environment code as stumbling block to their aspirations as a people.

Sagittarius Mining Inc. (SMI) plans to mine for copper and gold in its $6 billion Tampakan project but its operation could be derailed by the environment code.

BLAAN CHILDREN. Their future hitched to progress and development to be contributed by the mining industry to South Cotabato

With the threat of derailed progress of South Cotabato and consequently to the IPs, progress that SMI could bring, the IPs are raising up their arms against the provincial government.

The IPs’ future is not the only thing at stake here. Even their rights. Despite strong IP support for SMI, the voice of the lumads is not being heard. The IPs of Tampakan have ancestral domain rights over part of the project area.The IP right over ancestral domain is enshrined in the Indigenous Peoples Right Act (IPRA). The right allows IPs to enter into agreements with business, sharing part of profits from company operations.

SMI, to the IPs, is an angel from heaven to bring progress to tribal villages and the financial capacity to send their children to school.

The Blaans, the IPs ofTampakan, however, see hope in a recent order of President Aquino for authorities to find a compromise on the mining issue in South Cotabato.

It is through SMI that their  children now will have access to health services and education, with SMI around.

But even as SMI faces stormy weather before it can operate, the company already has sent more than 8,000 Blaan students to school as scholars. Its corporate social responsibility, infact, includes adult education for the tribe, which is much welcomed by the uneducated elders.

SMI is expected to employ some 9,000 workers in its construction stage and over 2,000 when the mine starts full swing operations. Lumads would be given preference, which should be a reason why the IP communities are up against their provincial government for passing the environment code that threatens the SMI operation.

        To the IPs, work means not only food for the table but also education for their children.

Even South Cotabato governor Arthur Pingoy concedes that education has been the biggest beneficiary from the presence of mining companies in his province.

Governor Pingoy highlights gains in the education programs of his administration citing support from the mining companies and other private companies.

Our shortage of 15,000 chairs for all public schools in the province has already been bridged through the efforts of SMI and other companies, the governor said.

SMI is proponent of the proposed Tampakan Copper-Gold Project hosted by South Cotabato, Davao del Sur, Sarangani, and Sultan Kudarat. It is said to be potentially the biggest single foreign investment in the country.

In a recent sustainability report released by the company, SMI has declared supporting 19,000 elementary, high school and college students for the year 2010 alone, in the form of tuition and other school fees and monthly allowances and has provided salary support for teachers within its proposed project area.

The report also declared that SMI has invested PhP135 million (USD3 million) in 2010 as part of its Corporate Social Involvement (CSI) initiatives including education, health, livelihood and enterprise-building programs.BY ROGER M. BALANZA

TAMPAKAN SAGITTARIUS MINES, NATIONAL GREENING PROGRAM AND SAVING PHILIPPINE FORESTS

 

 

 

 

Apart from community-based programs under their Corporate Social Responsibility, the most tangible evidence of mining companies complying with rules and regulations on environmental protection under the Philippine Mining Act of 1995 is their programs on reforestation.

The mining act mandates that mining companies must replace if not restore vegetation destroyed in the process of the mining operation.

The Sagittarius Mines Inc. (SMI) behind the US$55 million Tampakan Gold-Copper Project in South Cotabato, is among those closely watched by government on compliance with environmental protection.
But the Department of Ennvironment and Natural Resources (DENR) may not be having headaches in monitoring SMI.
Even before it could start operation in 2016, SMI, with a 10,000-hectare concession that straddles South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat and Davao del Sur, already has set into place a massive and continuing regreening program started as early as 2008.

Tree-planting activities, in the concession area and extending to areas adjacent to it, are ongoing being implemented by SMI and backstopped by peoples organizations, NGOs, socio-civic clubs, schools, corporate entities, Church groups, local overnment units and other sectors who are pursuing their own respective reforestation and tree planting projects and provided by SMI with seedlings and other planting materials.

South Cotabato is a victim of uncontrolled illegal logging in the past, and illegal mining in the present, and has lost nearly all of its forest covers. The SMI greening program is helping it restore lost forests.
As what is happening everywhere, the people of South Cotabato are aware of global warming and how depleted forests had contrubuted to it, and are willing to help over-all efforts to help solve the climatic crisis placing Mother Earth in grave danger.
SMI with its resources may have come as an angel helping in the mission, at least in South Cotabato and its environs, to arrest global warming through its corporate reforestation program and linkages with various groups in the tree planting campaign.

The DENR has acknowledged that mining companies have resources to engage in massive reforestation, not only as part of their compliance with the
Philippine Mining Act, but also as an important partner in the National Greening Program (NGP).
This is the reason why DENR has entered into memorandum of agreements with mining companies foremost of which is the SMI as important partners of the government in the implementation of the NGP.
For its part, SMI has pushed the antes further as far as the greening program is concerned by entering into partnerships with local government units in Region Eleven and Region Twelve in the collaborative effort of successfully implementing the NGP.
Unlike before the mining act of 1995 when mining companies were not mandated to embed reforestation programs in their operations, the mining companies of today are forced to adopt responsible mining as the barometer of how deserving they are of the permits given them by the government.
The “sins of the past” of mining companies–massive floods, forest denudation and other threats to environment and people—are now being addressed by the Philippine Mining Act that imposes responsible mining as the mantra that should govern mining operations that must balance environmental protection with economic activities.

It is with high hopes mining companies would play an important role in the NGP that is targeting about 500,000 hectares for tree planting in the period 2012 to 2016.
The DENR projects the Philippines would have more green forest areas than deforested ones if NGP meets its 2016 goal of planting some 1.5 billion tree seedlings in about 1.5 million hectares of open, denuded and degraded forest land nationwide.
Philippine areas designated as forests account for about half of the country’s estimated total land area of some 30 million hectares.
Studies show that deforestation reduced the country’s forest cover from over 50 percent of land at the 20th century’s start to only about 24 percent at present. ROGER M. BALANZA