Challenges to Puerto Princesa as the Lone Green City

Lynch May H. Ulsano
Palawan State University
Puerto Princesa City

Looking at the City’s Current Situation
Recent media reports state that the inclusion of Puerto Princesa’s Underground River as one of the New Seven Wonders of Nature has increased the arrival of tourists from 160,000 in 2007, to 514,000 last year.  Mayor Edward Hagedorn said that it would likely hit 625,000 this year and 1.2 Million a year by 2016.  From only four flights daily, the city’s small airport, now has to accommodate twenty flights daily.

Hagedorn attributed this not only to its jewel, the underground river but but also to other places of entertainment being developed in the city.

“Dati wala kaming zip line, ngayon ang dami na. Dati hindi masyadong popular and trekking, ngayon popular na,” Hagedorn said, adding that the city now has floating restaurants, and shark and dolphin watching facilities, among others.

He said that while not all of the 514,000 visitors recorded in 2011 actually went to see the underground river, around 60 percent to 70 percent did.

With the sudden influx of tourists is the question and challenges of sustainability.  Tourists are now every where.  One out of every three vehicles on city streets is a van packed with tourists, crawling behind tricycles buzzing around like flies.

To accommodate them resulted with the construction of new tourist facilities which are going on simultaneously all over the city.  Dust has no time to settle.  Rapid change is everywhere; the city is aggressively in expansion mode.  I fear that time will come that I could no longer recognize it.

Already evident are the traffic, urban congestion and visual chaos that follow the rush to build up a city known to be the greenest in the country.

Puerto Princesa nowadays has that boomtown feel.  The city is changing right before your eyes, and in a year or so it will be practically unrecognizable.

Borrowing from my reference, the Puerto Princesa that I know way back in my elementary days and a few of my high school days as they say and I could compare based on what I can see on TV and movies is a unique city.  It is city with a rural identity because it is green unlike others.  Fully grown trees shaded its broad main avenues, a perfect green foil to the low-rise structures along the streets.

Now, those endangered avenues are harder to find now.  New development is homogenizing the look of the city, soon to look like all other newly developed areas in any other Philippine city where one-strip mall after another lines streets with no sidewalks and no trees.

I fear that current changes have also affected the life style and norms of the common folks.  With this is the fear that the introduction of mall culture might endanger the simple life style and morality that Palawan people are known for and that with this, because of materialism, the environment is highly at risk particularly the southern part even the northern part even when the law is strictly being implemented.

How will they go against the temptation of wanting more? Of over stretching their budget just to buy this and buy that? Or, so that their will be more money to finance unnecessary wants, to look for other sources commonly against righteousness.

Recommendations
Strict planning and zoning should be instituted and implemented to preserve Puerto Princesa’s identity that sets it apart from any other place in the country and that makes the city a tourist attraction.

It should maintain what is it known for, the green city and the province on its part, worthy of being called, the last frontier.

Aside from allowing maximum development to happen in a regulated manner to prevent overdevelopment, zoning and planning measures control traffic, pollution; and while allowing the city to grow, control measures maintain growth at sustainable levels.

Determining and maintaining sustainable levels to effectively manage tourism growth are essential to keep alive the goose that lays Puerto Princesa’s golden eggs.  The goal is to sustain rather than deplete tourism resources.

The question of the human impact particularly on the underground river should also be studied and of primordial concern.

How does the increased carbon dioxide from human exhalation impact on the ecosystem balance within the cave?  There were reports that the number of bats living in the cave have decreased, an indication of a change in the ecosystem balance within the cave.

Humans introduce lint that flies around, attaches to the cave walls, and impedes the natural formation of stalactites and stalagmites.  Think of how much lint an average of 45,000 humans who enter the cave per month can give off.  How do the rock formations combat lint?

Being inscribed on the World Heritage List requires managing and maintaining the natural equilibrium of the park, assuring its sustainability and its future, while allowing tourists and visitors to enjoy its natural beauty.

A Management plan to protect and guide all impacts in the entire Puerto Princesa Subterranean River Park is what the city is committed to.  And it should insure by all its might and of the law that it is strictly implemented without pause.

The tourist buzz is expected to bring more benefits to the Puerto Princesa community, and it should.

However, unless sustainability guides the tourist boom, in the end the benefits could turn out to be not only short-lived, but also harmful to the city’s tourism assets, providing only temporary relief for the community.

Tourism is normally double-edged:  beneficial when well-managed, and disastrous when tourism assets are exploited.

If not hatched sustainably, those golden eggs may turn out not be golden in the long run.

References:

Elona Jamie Marie, Tourist arrivals in Puerto Princesa likely to hit 700,000, INQUIRER.net
5:16 pm | Wednesday, April 18th, 2012

Villalon Augusto F., Augusto F., Is Puerto Princesa’s tourism boom sustainable? Philippine Daily Inquirer 1:08 am | Monday, March 12th, 2012

Disorder and Chaos During the Holiday Season

Just like last Christmas, I have gone to the wet market here in our city to buy some food stuff for the new year only to be disgusted by the chaos and dirt.  Plastics and all sorts of garbage are just scattered everywhere while vendors who are responsible for all those mess do nothing.  What make the matter worst is that these vendors are occupying almost all the spaces they can creating traffic jams of both people and the public and private transport.  Undisciplined consumers however just throw there garbage.

This is better for a public market but not in the place mentioned here.

I don’t know but the authorities are unmindful of the matter. While everybody just keep the heck out of it.  The vendors and the consumers responsible and the authorities who are all accountable don't care.  Yet some of these individuals are even promoting tourism?

I just cant help but to ask myself, is it the worth of the Holiday Season?  Of Christmas and New Year in this part of the country and the world?  That it tend to downplay discipline and order just because it is so? What has happened now to the supposed spiritual maturity and enlightenment that Christmas should have been brought.  Or what about the challenge of constinuously striving for changes for the better that every new year gives?  An ordinary visitor like me was disgusted and highly irritated, what more for visitors or new comers.

This is only the tip of the iceberg in this city.  Not to include undisciplined commuters and drivers who are contributors to traffic jams.  And the garbage too in almost every corner.  Really irritating! 

For over a hundred years, our country has been celebrating New Year and Christmas as a colonized nation, later an independent state.  For centuries too, we are taught that Christmas brought with us God and New Year is the time to forget the bad old and retain the good even improve it for the new.

However, these have fallen on deaf ears and what matters now is self satisfaction.  Political leaders in the city however seem to be unmindful or totally ignorant of the matter.  What have we different from the things we consider evil?  For example, many are willing to spend money on dangerous fire crackers but are unwilling to support their churches and schools.

I feel aggravated because these are all what the youngsters are always seeing.  What is more irritating is these people want lots from the government and the state yet instead of being part of the solution, they are part of the problem.  The local government however is soft on the matter-- the downside of popular and patronage politics.

Still, I have high hopes and faith in the power of prayer.  And that somewhere, out there, there are also individuals who feel the same shame as I do who happens to have connections or contacts to responsible individuals- disregarding the evils of popular patronage politics for the common good.

I hope that this new year will make evil doers and unrighteousness become new as this season expects them to be. I wish too that leaders in the area may come to see it for themselves so that they could implement what is necessary.  God Speed!

(This blogger writes in the suburb of Lucena City.  He is irritated and stressed that order seems to be deteriorating partly because of lack of discipline and certain level of humanity viz animalistic behavior and apathy of the many.)

DepEd calls schools to strengthen environmental education

In  view  of  the  pressing  global  concerns and  issues  on  the  environment,  the Department  of  Education  (DepEd) urges all public and private schools to lead the role on environmental  awareness  by  enhancing  environmental education  and  by  pursuing effective school-based activities that seek to preserve and protect the environment through a DepEd Order No. 52. s, 2011.

This is  in pursuant to Republic Act  (R.A.) No.  9512, entitled "An Act to Promote Environmental Education and  for Other Purposes."

Towards  this end,  all  public  and  private schools  are called to undertake  the  following activities:

• Intensifying  lessons  regarding environment  on all  science  subjects. Environmental concerns shall also be used as  tools for classroom drills, discussions and activities and shall be  taught and  be integrated in the related learning areas; 
• Encouraging  the  school  administrators,  officials  and  teachers  to  use various instructional materials  such  as   books, visual  aids,  teaching guides and materials in making the students aware of  the concerns and issues on  the  environment which  shall  promote students' participation in environmental activities and advocacies and instill in their minds the need to preserve and protect the environment;
• Encouraging  the  teachers  to  attend  lecture-seminars, workshops, conferences  and  other forums relating  to  environmental education which may be considered in their application for promotion;
• Establishing the Youth for  Environment in  School Organizations  (YES- 0) pursuant  to DepEd Order  No.  72, s. 2003  by  all  public and  private elementary  (Grades IV-VI) and secondary schools; and
• Establishing,  registering,  monitoring  and  evaluating  the YES-0  and other  related  organizations, which  shall  be  under the  administration and supervision  of  the DepEd7s Center  for  Students and Co-Curricular Affairs (CSCA); hence, regular reports shall be submitted by the CSCA to the Undersecretary  for  Programs  and  Projects, Undersecretary for Regional  Operations  and Undersecretary  for  Legal  and  Legislative Affairs. 

Aside from the formal public-private schools, the Bureau  of  Elementary Education (BEE), Bureau  of  Secondary Education (BSE) and Bureau  of  Alternative Learning System  (BALS) shall integrate environmental education including issues and concerns in their review of  existing curricula.