132 With more than 1.6 million ha under CBFMA in 2011 FMBDENR 2011 and at least 4.3 million ha with CADTs NCIP
2012, the capacities of the communities and the IPs are tested as the governance-designated units with RAAs are required to protect, manage, develop and regulate activities in their respective areas. At this point, most community tenure and
domain holders have limited resources and capabilities to protect and manage their areas, rendering major portions, to a certain extent, as open access. Most of these community organizations and IP groups do not have internal capability to
manage, use or scale up modern or indigenous forest management technology, and manage or access financial resources. There has also been a highly regulated system for the communities and the IPs to access resource-use rights as initial
sources of revenues for their internal forest management operations. This had led to large areas under CBFMAs or CADTs being underdeveloped and not adequately protected, and has easily opened up opportunities for encroachment and illegal
extractive activities.
Many of the tenured areas were left on their own and at the mercy of market players and buyers. For instance, only 29.4 percent of the forests were found to have formal management plans during the 2002-2004 National Forest Assessment
FAO 2005. With EO 23, resource-use rights in natural forests were banned. Only seven out of the 26 IFMA holders have approved annual operations plans Calderon 2013. Without a forest-based revenue-generating operation, only those with
sufficient funds will be able to protect and conserve the remaining natural forests in their areas of responsibility. Those without adequate resources are deemed not to have self-interests to protect the remaining natural forests within their
tenured areas.
Regarding harvesting rights in natural forests such as those for IFMAs and CBFMAs and transporting the products to the market or a processing centre, the requirements for approval and other safeguard measures are deemed to be at the
whims of the government Tesoro and Angeles 2010; Guiang et al. 2008. Over the years, a culture of lack of trust has continued to persist among the government regulators, the applicants, the processors and marketers of wood and related
products. The private sector claims that the forestry sector has been overly regulated. This has indeed constrained private sector investment in the sector Tesoro and Angeles 2010. Despite the increasing demand for roundwood and fuelwood,
very few private sector and tenure holders have invested their own funds in plantation development. Existing tenure provisions in the instruments of IFMAs and CBFMAs do not simply allow them to access outside support for financing initial
operations and establishment costs Guiang and Castillo 2006; Guiang et al. 2008. The IFMA and CBFMA instruments cannot be used as ‘collaterals’ for accessing development loans even with government financial institutions. With the high
entry cost in developing tree farms, agroforestry and forest plantations, many of the tenure holders are hesitant or simply cannot afford to get into development.
As shown in Figure 2, the demand for roundwood in roundwood equivalent, RWE has increased over the past years. From more than 4 million m
3
of RWE, this is expected to increase to about 10 million m
3
of RWE. More than 65 percent of the 4 million m
3
of RWE requirements in 2010 came from imported wood Sibucao et al. 2013. The increasing demand, the limited source of domestic supply from forest plantations and limited capacities of resource management units to
effectively protect and manage their areas have become indirect causes of continuing forest loss and degradation of natural forests.
Fuelwood and charcoal are also expected to increase from the present level of around 70 million m
3
per annum Guiang 2013. Again, without adequate plantation forests and established fuelwood lots combined with weak tenure rights and
limited enforcement capacities of resource management units, accessible natural forests, especially the open canopy areas, shrublands and wooded lands will be highly threatened. In fact, it has been suspected that the major supply of fuelwood
and charcoal in major urban centres such as in Metro Manila, Metro Cebu, Davao and elsewhere has been sourced from accessible natural forests or existing government plantations.
Figure 2. Wood supply and consumption in the Philippines from 2000 to 2010 Sibucao et al. 2013
1000 2000
3000 4000
5000 6000
7000
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
Volume in 000 cu m
TOTAL RECORDED CONSUMPTION RWE of Domestic Consumption
Log Exports RWE of Processed Wood Exports
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3. Impacts of forest degradation
Forest degradation has had cumulative impacts on the economy, environment and the productivity of agriculture and fisheries. Degradation over the years, including the loss of forests, has forced the government to increase its allocation
to forest restoration. But forest degradation has also opened opportunities for collaboration, a deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of various terrestrial and marine ecosystems, and improved appreciation of externalities in the
environment and natural resources sector. A summary is provided below.
3.1 Economic impacts
The GDP contribution of the forestry sector has declined over the years from as high as 1.5 to 2.17 percent based on 1972 prices during 1975-1980 to 0.09 percent in 2006 based on 1985 prices De Rueda 2006. The GDP contribution
of forestry was only 0.07 percent during 2006-2010 ADMU 2011. The forestry sector has become a ‘sunset’ industry. The ENR sector has become a major ‘cost centre as it requires huge investments to rehabilitate and restore degraded and
deforested areas. Private sector investments in forest plantations have been quite limited over the past years Tesoro and Angeles 2010; Acosta 2002.
The immediate and local economic impact of forest degradation has been the sudden loss of employment opportunities – more than 400 000 direct employees – when most TLA holders were no longer allowed to harvest from the natural forest
resulting in the phasing out of most of the wood-processing facilities. Indirectly, the loss of employment negatively affected more than 2 million people. Many of the former logging and wood-processing complexes became ghost towns.
With more than 7.2 million ha now covered with shrubs and wooded grasslands Table 3 and an average cost of reforestation per hectare of US1 048, total restoration will amount to US7.5 billion. The use of ANR instead of standard
reforestation will incur a total cost of US4.2 billion with average cost of US579ha Bagong Pagasa Foundation 2011. An agroforestry approach will be more expensive but will attract more labour and time from farmer-participants and thus
reduce total cost by almost 30-40 percent per hectare. Estimates of previous investments in forest restoration have ranged from US0.6 to US1 billion, mostly from various donors in loans and in grants Pulhin et al. 2006; Guiang et.al. 2008.
By the end of 2013, the current National Greening Program NGP will have incurred a total accumulated cost of about US255 million for developing more than 600 000 ha. Rough calculation indicates that the average cost per hectare of
NGP reforestation is about US425ha.
Since 1989, the Philippines has become a net importer of wood to meet its domestic demand and processing of high- value finished products for export – the result of mismanagement of abundant and valuable natural forests in the past. In
2011, total imports of all forest-based products came to more than US60 million FMBDENR 2011. Although just 1.93 percent of the total national imports, this could have been avoided if the once abundant natural forests had been properly
managed. With the right incentives, the country could have also developed forest plantations as another source of raw materials.
3.2 Environmental impacts
Forest loss and degradation have also indirectly reduced the supply of water for irrigation, domestic use and energy generation. There are now 267 watersheds that are in critical condition because of their degraded forest cover. There is
also a suspicion that one of the reasons for the 0.1 percent reduction of cropping intensity of irrigated rice from 1995 to 2009 could be attributed to the decreasing supply of water from watersheds during the dry months.
Early studies revealed that forest loss and degradation have contributed to the depreciation of upland soils and indirectly reduced the productivity of fishery resources. An estimated 1 billion pesos was lost in 1996-1997 De Los Angeles and
Oliva 1996.
Most of the country’s watersheds have forest cover of less than 50 percent Walpole 2005; Bautista and Tan 2000. This condition exposes at least 60 percent of the country to multiple hazards, with those in the uplands being the most
economically affected and further marginalized by natural disasters WB 2005; DENR and DABFAR 2010.
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4. Implementation of forest restoration and rehabilitation initiatives
Deforestation converts forest to another land use or over the long term reduces tree canopy cover below the minimum 10 percent threshold. To restore deforested areas, degraded forests or previously non-forested areas, reforestation and
afforestation strategies may be used. Most forest restoration processes in the tropics involve reforestation, as opposed to afforestation Sajise 2003.
In the Philippines, strategies for forest restoration have evolved over time – with a mixture of objectives, institutional arrangements and technical approaches. This will be discussed briefly below.
4.1 History of initiatives, strategies and techniques
4.1.1 The history and emergence of various forest restoration strategies Government initiatives: Forest restoration in the Philippines – reforestation, rehabilitation, forest plantations, and later
with agroforestry and more organized ANR – started with academic efforts back in 1910 at the Forestry School now the University of the Philippines at Los Baños College of Forestry and Natural Resources in Los Baños Pulhin et al. 2006.
To bolster the rehabilitation efforts, the Reforestation Administration was created in 1972 to focus on the reforestation of more areas that were degraded, denuded and rapidly undergoing various stages of degradation and becoming grasslands.
By 1974, the government had reforested about 160 000 ha with the main objective of regreening, combined with testing the introduction of various indigenous and exotic species Pulhin et al. 2006. It was not clear whether these reforested
areas and plantations would eventually be the source of raw materials for the wood industry. Later the large reforestation projects became part of watershed reserve and research areas. Some have become germplasm sites for many indigenous
and exotic species.
After the martial law years and the entry of the Aquino administration, the government ushered in a strong environmental campaign that focused on curbing illegal logging, pro-people allocation of the remaining natural assets and renewed
reforestation efforts. The results are shown in Table 4. Reforestation reached more than 0.5 million ha during the 1986- 1992 period. Most of this planting – 425 800 ha – however, was the result of massive infusion of funds through loans
from the Asian Development Bank and Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund for contract reforestation by families, rural communities, LGUs and NGOs under the Forestry Sector Program Acosta 2002.
These reforestation efforts were strongly DENR-driven and were received with mixed response of ownership by the contracted entities. These efforts were in response to external clamour to balance both production and protection. Thus,
most plantations were established to rehabilitate watersheds. Tenure and long-term rights to what the families and the entities planted were not seriously considered – they appeared to be an ‘after thought’. Thus, most of these areas were
established after planting and initial maintenance and eventually turned over to the government for protection and management. Some communities eventually obtained tenure rights over what they had planted. These areas cannot serve
as an important supply source of industrial wood Acosta 2002; Pulhin et al. 2006.
Data from 2003 to 2007 revealed that at least 500 000 ha were ‘restored forests’ as a result of past reforestation, afforestation, and regeneration of degraded natural forests ERDB 2010. Sixty-two percent of this, however, was
accomplished by the government and the rest by the private sector.
Table 4. Forest planting by the government and private sector summarized by Acosta in 2002 from FMB forestry statistics 1997-2001
Period
Before 1980 1980-1985
1986-1992 1993-1998
1999-2001
Industrial wood planting
6 634 20 681
28 803 18 901
3 421
TLA reforestation compliance
67 689 111 300
132 956 95 138
8 893
Includes contract reforestation from
1989 onwards
184 029 179 389
425 802 147 609
69 799
Planting for environmental
purposes
15 358 18 653
6 130 27 048
4 561
Government Private sector
