TWO internationally acclaimed organizations known for promoting agriculture and fishery conservation are teaming up with different local governments on Siargao to ensure it will be self-sustainable with its food and fishery supplies, amid the growing number of tourists visiting the world-famous island all-year round.
Mariduque-based social enterprise AGREA and United States conservation group RARE are one in saying that with the cooperation of all the stakeholders, food security can be attained in Siargao, one of the most pristine islands in the Philippines and considered the country’s surfing mecca.
Surigao del Norte Dist. 1 Rep. Jose Francisco “Bingo’ Matugas II recently led the launching of the Food Sustenance and Security Project.
Rep. Matugas emphasized it is about time to start working on the food sustainability due to the huge influx of both foreign and local tourists visiting the island.
Most of the food supplies in Siargao are being consumed by the locals, while the island’s resorts and restaurants source food from outside, the nearest of which is Surigao City.
Siargao is also home to Asia’s biggest mangrove forest covering an area of about 9,000 hectares. It serves as a habitat for rare and endangered species of flora and fauna in marine, wetland, and terrestrial areas.
RARE Director Adonis Sucalit expressed his concern about overfishing, in Siargao and the entire Philippines.
Since RARE started its conservation program in the Philippines over 7 years ago, Sucalit noted a 391-percent increase in fish biomass in some of their sites.
In Siargao, RARE partnered with the municipalities of Dapa and Del Carmen in 2014 to implement FishForever, a rights-based approach to sustainable fisheries management.
One of the advocacies of RARE is to ensure the right size of marine protected areas, by working closely with the local governments to establish municipal marine protected areas, expanding them and putting protection in the right places, and observing what is underneath the waters, Sucalit said.
AGREAN chief executive officer Cherrie Atilano, for her part, expressed optimism about the potentials of Siargao in becoming a “one island economy” that is “zero waste, zero hunger, and zero insufficiency.”
With the cooperation of all the stakeholders, Atilano, who was awarded by the Asia Pacific CSR Council and UN Global Compact the Global Responsible Business Award 2017 for Agriculture Excellence, said the island can start a movement of a farm-to-table on a massive scale which is happening in Manila.
To start with, she said her organization has to first work with the farmers and the business owners to determine the basic ingredients needed in the island.
Part of this, said Atilano, is to push for inclusiveness where the existing businesses would source their food stocks like vegetables from Siargao farmers.
While it is known as a behavioral change organization, RARE is also renowned for its social marketing approaches, such as in correcting the destruction of the coral reefs due to the illegal method of fishing.
Furthermore, part of RARE’s behavioral campaign is to recognize the fisherfolk by helping them register and have the license to fish. Second is to guide them to the right place outside the marine protected areas.
Sucalit said they are in the process of coordinating with the various LGUs to identify the “manage access areas” so that fishermen will no longer intrude in the “no-take zones.”
RARE will be also working with resort and restaurant owners in gathering information on what their customers want to eat. This, he said, would help them assess the stocks of the species that are in demand.
Considered the center of global coral ecosystem biodiversity, the Philippines’ waters contain almost 10 percent of the world’s coral reefs, large swaths of mangrove forests and more Marine Protected Areas than any other country.
According to RARE, more than 1.6 million small-scale fishers and their families rely on coastal waters to provide income and sustenance. They are among the poorest and most vulnerable sectors in the country.
It noted that the average catch per day has been declining steadily for decades. Fishers now spend more time at sea, going further and further from home, for smaller yields.