The Aboitiz Group has partnered with the provincial government of Cebu in a large-scale, multi-year reforestation and watershed recovery project to green the Mananga-Lusaran River.
The partnership signed last week is called CarbonPH Project and touted as the first large-scale reforestation and watershed recovery program in Cebu province.
Signatories to the project include Sabin Aboitiz, Aboitiz Group president and chief executive officer; Cebu governor Gwen Garcia; acting Cebu City Mayor Raymond Alvin Garcia and Talisay City mayor Gerald Anthony Gullas Jr.’s representative vice mayor Richard Francis Aznar.
The key component of CarbonPH is the reforestation of the Central Cebu Protected Landscape (CCPL) encompassing a land area of 29,000 hectares.
The CCPL is Cebu’s main water source stretching over the cities of Cebu, Talisay, Toledo and Danao and the municipalities of Minglanilla, Consolacion, Liloan, Compostela and Balamban.
The protected area also includes the watershed forest reserves in Mananga and Cotcot Lusaran, the Buhisan Dam and the national parks in Central Cebu and Sudlon.
Beyond ensuring a clean water source, CarbonPH will boost biodiversity, protect endangered species and absorb carbon dioxide to help fight climate change.
Local communities near CCPL will benefit from sustainable job opportunities in forest management, eco-tourism, and agroforestry, contributing to local economic growth.
Residents will also be engaged as active partners in the reforestation of the CCPL which was designated a protected area in 2007 under the CCPL Act.
The area is also home to several endemic bird species including the Black Shama, Cebu Flowerpecker, Cebu Cinnamon Tree or Kaninga, Philippine Tube-nosed Fruit Bat and the rufous-lored kingfisher.
Aboitiz said protecting the area is crucial given the aggressive and illegal conversion of the protected area into agricultural land and the ecologically destructive livelihood activities such as kaingin and improper waste disposal that accelerated the loss of tree cover in the CCPL.
Aboitiz cited data from the Global Forest Watch indicating areas whose territories form part of the protected landscape that have lost over 7,000 hectares of forest cover from 2001 to 2022. The diminishing forest cover resulted in the loss of biodiversity, with 11 out of 204 bird species and 2 out of 34 mammal species on the verge of extinction.
