PASAY CITY (PIA) -- Senate President Pro Tempore Loren Legarda pushes for the establishment of National Coastal Greenbelt Zones and the institutionalization of a coastal greenbelt management action plan under Senate Bill No. 1117 or the “National Coastal Greenbelt Act of 2022.”

The proposed bill also aims to lessen the impacts of strong typhoons and to protect the people living in coastal areas.

The senator said “Mangrove forests, beach forests, and seagrass beds act as natural defenses against strong typhoons, coastal erosion, and storm surges. Mangroves, in particular, are vital for climate stabilization as they store and sequester carbon better than tropical forests. Such importance was highlighted when mangrove forests in Del Carmen, Siargao protected the coastal communities therein from the wrath of typhoon Odette, the strongest typhoon in 2021.”

Further, Senator Legarda emphasizes the need to protect the 822 coastal communities in the country as well as the necessity of having a comprehensive water resource management plan which should be integrated into all development plans, programs, and projects of all public and private sectors and local communities and public in general.

Coastal greenbelts are under threat brought by land development and reclamation, deforestation, pollution, illegal conversion, and the conversion of mangrove forests to fishponds. These greenbelts play an important role in climate change adaptation and mitigation as well as in disaster risk reduction that is why they must be protected.

“We should revive the ecological integrity and restore the bounty of our coastal communities in view of mitigating the damaging effects of natural coastal risks on human lives and properties. We need to develop and implement science-based policies for mangrove restoration and regeneration, as well as map coastal resources across the country, because we won’t know what we will protect and preserve if we do not know what we actually have,” Legarda explained.

The senator’s proposed measure also aims for the establishment of a National Technical Committee on Coastal Greenbelt Zones (NTAC). Its functions include preparing a comprehensive and integrated National Coastal Greenbelt Management Plan (NCGMAP). This will be an attached agency of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). The NCGMAP will have Operational Plans, which shall contain the reversion of all abandoned fishponds into mangroves through natural regeneration.

Due to the absence of data sharing and systematic collaboration among concerned agencies, Senator Legarda lamented that now, the government is constrained to implement the reversion of abandoned, underutilized, and undeveloped fishponds.

This goes to show that there is a need to integrate, consolidate, and institutionalize the coastal greenbelt framework strategy and action plans into all development plans, programs, and projects, and into all actions and decisions of the national and local governments, businesses, non-government organizations, and local communities.

“Our natural life support systems and our people will be protected and made more resilient by institutionalizing coastal greenbelt zones, which is a nature-based solution. It will also ensure agency coordination and collaboration, both of which are urgently required if we are to reduce and adapt to the effects of climate change and mainstream sustainable development for all,” the senator concluded. (OSLL)