Environment Secretary Antonia Loyzaga has called on the business community to deal with plastic pollution to avoid the destruction of the country’s ecosystems.
Loyzaga sought the commitment of private companies to fully implement the the Extended Producers Responsibility (EPR) law of 2022 and urged them to be environmentally responsible throughout the life cycle of a product, especially its post-consumer or end-of-life stage.
The DENR chief made the plea in a speech before the general membership meeting of the Management Association of the Philippines (MAP) on June 14 in Taguig City. She said “climate action for resilience is everyone’s business.”
She said the EPR law was an opportunity to curb the destruction of ecosystems by setting targets for large enterprises to cover and divert 20 percent of the plastic waste they produce in 2022 by the end of 2023, gradually increasing this by 40 percent by 2024 and setting 10 percent targets until 80 percent can be decreased and reached by 2028 onwards.
“Some of you have already stepped forward and committed to work with us,” she said. “Among the biggest threats to the environment is our unsustainable consumption and production practices that lead to production of polluting waste. This is where our partnerships would not only be strategic but critical to our survival,” she said.
“Confronting the complex roots of the pollution on land, seas and air requires a whole of society effort that will come at a cost but will have far reaching benefits,” she added.
The DENR chief stressed that investments were needed not just in diversion and collection, but also in research for the substitution of single use plastic.
“Unless there is a product that has the same functionality and affordability as single use plastic, the demand for its use, particularly among communities that can afford no other ways to consume and store will not wane,” she said.
Loyzaga has also urged the country’s top business leaders to work with government on efforts to address the climate crisis and create sustainable communities.
“Our government needs partners who go beyond ESG (environmental, social and governance) and the fence lines of their operations to ensure ecosystem integrity and the resilience of communities that surround their operations,” Loyzaga told an assembly of CEOs, COOs and other top management executives from the largest companies in the Philippines.
She said the government also needs “partners who go beyond compliance to achieve strategic shared values, and who are committed within their core business value cycles to going beyond just their specific contributions to GDP (gross domestic product).”
Loyzaga said the Marcos administration’s agenda of “pursuing a green and blue economy and establishing livable and sustainable communities” guides the DENR in fulfilling its mandate of protecting the environment, managing risk, and building resilience in all natural domains.
“Our work covers the air we breathe, all life on land and below water, and all our natural resources. In sum, our priorities are to protect, conserve, restore and regenerate the ecosystems that serve as the life support for all human, social and economic development,” she said. DENR news