The city fights back

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Not a long time ago, the army worms staged war against the city of Cebu, using all of Buhisan's teak leaves as their victims of mass destruction.

Now, the city fights back.

It has been found out that there are only five forest wardens for the 29,000-hectare CCPL. Without the city counterpart, the tanods only get an honorarium of Php 100.00 a month.

And the Buhisan Dam now serves around 150,000 cubic meters of water compared to how much it is originally designed to provide - 500,000 cubic meters.

MCWD and CUSW is seriously considering the gradual removal of teak trees, which will be replaced with indigenous trees. This will help promote biodiversity in Cebu and save water at the same time.

SWCF has ideas, too. Selectively log and replace, they say. Sell the teak which will be slowly replaced with indigenous trees - it's one of the finest pieces of lumber - and use the proceeds for any community-based projects.

If the city is seriously looking at Buhisan as an ecotourism site, they have to have the birds.

The Php 2 million royalty courtesy of MCWD must also be pushed, they added.

Law enforcement should be strictly implemented, which would take a lot of political will. The barangays should be involved in all this. Community organizing is a must.

There will be more meetings after this, but I am sure we are all heading towards the right direction now.

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