Good afternoon, everybody.

Welcome to the first meeting of

your Committee on Environment and Natural Resources. Let me
recognize the presence of Senator

There are _______ bills and ______ resolutions referred to the

Committee which we shall classify and prioritize. We hope to
address all of them.

Today, we will start a period of stock-taking to find out the

real state of our environment throughout the expanse of our
archipelago. We shall also want to know how much of our natural
resources remain for utilization, conservation and protection to
enable coming Filipino generations to enjoy them well into the
future. President Aquino had expressed having a National Land
Use law approved during his incumbency, and I surmise, to be
signed by him before his next SONA.

Your Committee would also want an inventory of the good

practices that we must implement at all levels of government so
that the Philippines would contribute to a better state of the
planet Earth. Like all Filipinos, I want to see an end to the list of
environmental horrors where the name of the Philippines always
lands at the top, such as : dirtiest rivers, tallest garbage dumps,
most denuded forests, dirtiest air, worst mine spills and many
others.
 Two weeks ago, the Senate Economic Planning Office (SEPO)
recommended for the environment sector the passage of laws on
National Land Use Policy and Water Resources Management. The
SEPO also categorized the modernization of PAGASA under the
environment. They recommend supporting it as localized weather
patterns and climate change affect the capacity of our resources
to provide food and water security.

And in so addressing the environment and natural resource

issues, I also hope that workers and professionals in the
environment and natural resource sector will not find themselves
in danger just because they are doing their jobs. On this day also,
I am reminded that on my first year as Senator, a friend had died,
he was killed. He was an environmentalist. Also, that goes for the
volunteers and deputized personnel in the ground such as the
Bantay Dagat and Gubat, Bantay Tsimneya, Tambutso and Sunog
Basura. We also need to assess if we have to restructure them to
make them more effective, or know if they are effective at all as
they are. I am reminded that despite the deputization and
creation of various task forces, EDSA air remains heavily polluted.

In this session, we also hope to be provided information that

will guide us if the environment mandate is better separated from
the natural resource utilization mandate of the DENR. Bills to that
effect will also be tackled. They are important also in light of the
priority given to the National Land Use Policy. The matter of
creating the NLUP similarly will have to start with the status of
land classification. Where are we now in that respect? Are the
figures presented for the Alienable and Disposable Land, Total
forest Land (Unclassified forest land and classified public forest)
still accurate?

Likewise, we want to know whether of the classified public

forest (forest reserves, established timberland, national parks,
game refuge and bird sanctuaries & wilderness areas, military
and naval reservation, civil reservation, fishpond development)
remains as such. What are their actual uses today?

This also introduces the discussion on what areas need

rehabilitation to return them to their previous healthy state, or if
it is possible at all. Then also we have to ask why our environment
laws are violated, with impunity, by small and big entities who we
know comply with environmental laws in other countries,
foremost of these are the mining companies. Do we need
stringent laws or heavier penalties?

And very important is to know what places are safe for

human settlements especially in this age of disasters exacerbated
by climate change. Let us see if Sustainable Development and
other terms on which tons of books have been written are doable
or will just be slogans repeated time and again.
 After the stock-taking in this Briefing to be presented by the
Department of Environment and Natural Resources, we shall
come up with the Legislative agenda that we hope to accomplish
during the Fifteenth Congress.