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Village folk tapped to protect endangered Cagayan caves

By CHARLIE C. LAGASCA

TUGUEGARAO CITY – Village folk in Peñablanca town here have been tapped to act as guardians of the remaining forest cover in said Cagayan’s southeastern town, which also is host to the famed seven-chambered Callao caves.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) yesterday said that it awarded tracts of land within the Peñablanca Protected Landscape and Seascape (PPLS) to members of the Bugatay Upland Farmers Multipurpose Coop. to ensure its continued protection from the entry of timber poachers and other environmentally-destructive activities.

“We believe that if people have a stake in a certain area, they are more than keen in protecting it from others who are out to destroy the environment,” said Felix Taguba, provincial environment and natural resources officer.

A government-protected, the PPLS, comprising some 119,000 hectares of forest land forms with the nearby Isabela’s Northern Sierra Madre National Park and other wildlife reserves in the area, the Northern Sierra Madre Biodiversity Corridor, one of the world’s environmental hotspots.

The PPLS area has reportedly been beset by entry of illegal loggers or timber poachers, wildlife poachers and small-scale miners whose activities have started to negatively affect the immediate environment, including the famous Callao Caves in the villages of Parabba and Quibal.

Dr. Theresa Lim of the Protected Area and Wildlife Bureau (PAWB), one of those who graced the recent awarding of communal land tenurial instrument to cooperative members, stressed the importance of community involvement in the preservation of the forest.

“This considering the fact that the remaining forest guards are already aging and the employment of new ones appears to very slim due to the DENR’s miniscule budget,” she said.

According to Taguba, their office has pushed for joint management by residents in the protected areas to make them feel that they have an important role in ensuring that the environment from which they have been obtaining the source of their livelihood will continually be protected.

“The Department has come to realize the importance of (community) participation rather than treating them as adversaries out to exploit the environment,” he said.

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