PALO, Leyte, Philippines – Four members of President Aquino’s cabinet have been tasked to craft Philippines’ mining policy, which is aimed at preserving the country’s natural resources and at the same time make use of minerals without sacrificing the environment.
Aquino said he has directed Environment Secretary Ramon Paje, presidential advisers Neric Acosta and Elisea Gozun and Climate Change Commission head Mary Ann Lucille Sering to come up with a comprehensive mining policy.
“Sila ang maglalabas ng policy, tatawagin ang lahat ng stakeholders, idadaan sa kanila para mayroon tayong consensus kung paano nga ba natin patakbuhin iyung mining industry ng Pilipinas,” he told reporters in a chance interview here.
The President led the celebration of the 67th anniversary of the Leyte Gulf landing.
Paje heads the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Acosta is presidential adviser on environment protection while Gozun a former DENR secretary during Arroyo’s time is now Aquino’s presidential adviser on ecological matters.
Acosta is actually wearing two hats, or in a concurrent capacity, both as environment czar and as acting board member of the Laguna Lake Development Authority whose former head, general manager Rodrigo Cabrera Aquino had replaced last September.
“Two things: Number one, gawin nating ma-regulate para mabantayan ang kalikasan, ma-maximize iyung pupunta sa gobyerno at sa bayan; Pangalawa, i-preserve iyung ating potentials lalo na sa eco-tourism at talaga namang pangalagaan iyung ating kalikasan.”
Aquino said he prefers allowing large-scale mining firms to operate rather than small ones, who only tend to contribute to the pollution of the environment, particularly because they don’t have the means and capability to protect the country’s resources.
“So ang solusyon dapat talaga diyan, okay iyung large scale na may kakayahan na itama iyung damage sa kalikasan pero iwasan na magka-damage to begin with,” he told reporters in an interview.
Small mining firms, according to him, are harder to regulate.
Aquino gov’t will ensure ‘transparency’ in mining revenues Ochoa
Malacañang has vowed to impose utmost transparency in the revenues that the Aquino government will be earning from operations of mining companies in the country, Executive Secretary Paquito “Jojo” Ochoa Jr. said.
“High on our agenda is transparency in revenues derived from mining,” he said in a statement, pointing out the need to determine how the mining sector contributes to sustainable development.
According to Ochoa, the government is already “taking steps to ensure that profits generated by mining companies translate into state revenues and that mining benefits trickle down to the general public.”
He made the promise in a speech he delivered at Hotel Sofitel in Pasay City, where the Mining Philippines 2011 Conference and Exhibition was held.
Ochoa revealed the country’s intention to apply for compliance status with the London-based Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (EITI) to help achieve the much-needed reforms in the mining industry.
EITI is a global initiative that requires participating governments to publicly report the revenues they receive from extractive industry companies and for those companies to publicly report the revenues they pay to government.
This mechanism allows more transparency in revenue reporting.
“Further reforms are therefore needed to ensure that the acceptability of mining is enhanced and its impact as a driver of economic growth is truly felt,” the executive secretary added.
Data from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources show that mining contributed P110 billion to the gross domestic product and generated P12.5 billion in tax revenues, royalties, and fees for the government last year.
Ochoa said the country’s EITI candidacy and subsequent membership is consistent with the “vision of good governance” of the Aquino administration.
“It will be a strong manifestation of transparency if the payments and revenues received by the government from the development of the country’s mineral resources and how these are utilized are made public,” he said.
The conference was attended mostly by industry players who comprise the Chamber of Mines of the Philippines.
Ochoa said that while the Mining Act of 1995 has put in place environmental and safety nets to address mining concerns, efforts must be stepped up for awareness and strict compliance of the law.
He also underscored the need to strike a balance between mining and protecting the environment and natural resources toward achieving enhanced social acceptability of mining operations.
Aware that the Philippine mining industry has been the subject of intense scrutiny by various sectors, Ochoa called on industry players to overcome the negative stigma attached to mining and to continue to work hard to gain public acceptability.
“But done in a manner that takes into consideration the importance of safeguarding the environment, we know that mining can contribute significantly both to sustained economic development and poverty reduction in the countryside,” Ochoa said. –Delon Porcalla (The Philippine Star)
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