Project description

Title: Programme for sustainable management of natural resources
Commissioned by: Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ)
Country: Philippines
Lead executing agency: Philippine Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) and Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR)
Partner: : the relevant Philippine governmental authorities and agencies at the national level, selected local administrative authorities, non-governmental organisations, scientific institutions, private sector entities
Overall term: July 2005 to (projected) June 2015

Context

The natural resources of the Philippines have suffered dramatically in recent decades from rapid population growth and uncontrolled overexploitation of nature. The destruction of forests continues, as does overexploitation of ocean and coastal resources. As a result, biological diversity is rapidly declining and basic, natural foodstuffs such as fish are no longer producing in sufficient quantities. Furthermore, deforestation promotes soil erosion and loss of valuable agricultural land as well as susceptibility to landslides, which occur in the Philippines every year, taking the lives of many people. Overexploitation of natural resources impacts the rural poor in particular. About one half of all rural households live below the poverty line.
The region encompassing the provinces of Leyte and Samar is known nationwide for its production of raw materials such as coconut and Manila hemp. However, these raw materials are rarely processed locally, and therefore contribute neither to local value adding nor to creating more employment opportunities. The Government of the Philippines wants to introduce measures to counter this development, promote sustainable use of the nation’s natural resources, establish nature conservation areas, and productively integrate impoverished highland populations in efforts to preserve the remaining forest areas. However, multiple governmental departments and regulatory authorities - whose scopes of authority and responsibilities in part overlap and clash - are involved in the management of conservation and utilisation of natural resources. Moreover, legal reforms have now given local administrative authorities responsibility for many issues. These local administrations, in turn, often lack the expertise and means to meet their newly assumed duties. Initiatives launched at the local level are hardly coordinated and agreed with authorities of the central state, if at all.

Objective

The responsible governmental authorities possess the necessary expertise to plan and implement environmental protection programmes. Overlapping scopes of responsibility and authority have been clarified, and regulatory authorities work together efficiently and in a spirit of trust. The quality of services has improved and is more customer-oriented. Services are rendered promptly and the local effects seen more rapidly, and supplies delivered more quickly to their destinations. Concrete action for environmental protection is implemented locally in the form of projects that also include local community administrative authorities. These projects lead to improved quality of life in the target areas.

Approach

Since the programme launch, GIZ (until December 2010 GTZ) has worked closely together with the Philippine Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) and Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), all three of which are involved in addressing issues of conservation and sustainable use of the natural resources found in the nation’s highland and coastal regions. Public authorities and administrations are also involved at the regional and local levels. It is there, for example, that land use plans and agreements governing sustainable fishery and forestry are being introduced. GIZ supports its partners within the programme by providing advisory services, continuing education and studies, and by running pilot projects within the scopes of the various programme components outlined below. Besides expert staff targeted at governmental departments and authorities, the beneficiaries of the programme include in particular low-income families with livelihoods tied to agriculture, forestry, fishery and aquaculture as well as beneficiaries of Philippine agrarian reform.

This programme comprises the following components

• Promoting agriculture
• Disaster Preparedness in the Eastern Visayas