Community Engagement

Solidarity and Citizenship 12

Quarter 2
Module 9
Environmental
Action Initiatives
 12
Quarter 2
Module 9

Environmental
Action Initiatives

Introductory Message
For the facilitator:
 This module was designed to provide you with fun and meaningful
opportunities for guided and independent learning at your own pace and time. You
will be enabled to process the contents of the learning material while being an
active learner.

This module has the following parts and corresponding icons:

Expectation - These are what you will be able to know

after completing the lessons in the module

Pre-test - This will measure your prior knowledge and the

concepts to be mastered throughout the lesson.

Recap - This section will measure what learnings and skills

that you understand from the previous lesson.

Lesson- This section will discuss the topic for this module.

Activities - This is a set of activities you will perform.

Wrap Up- This section summarizes the concepts and

applications of the lessons.

Valuing-this part will check the integration of values in the

learning competency.

Post-test - This will measure how much you have learned from
the entire module.

E X PE C TAT I O N

1. Expound on the concept of environmental activism.

2. Examine the areas of advocacies of selected environmental groups.
3. Appreciate the importance of environmental action initiatives in protecting,
conserving and restoring the environment

PRETEST

Direction: Write the word True if the statement is correct and False if it is not. Write
your answer in the space provided for it.
1. The NMAP exposed the true intent of government in promoting the minerals
industry.
2. The Alyansa Tigil Mina is a coalition of organizations and groups who have
decided to collectively challenge the aggressive promotion of large-scale fishing
in the Philippines.
3. Climate Crowd, which uses crowd-source data to better understanding climate
change’s effects.
4. WWF collaborate with people around the world to develop innovative solutions
that protect communities, wildlife, and the places in which they live.

5. The Mines, Minerals and Sustainable Development emphasized the alarming

impact of climate change on species right now.

RECAP

In the last module discussions focused on the political and economic action
initiatives. Reflect on what have you learned from this lesson. Complete the
unfinished sentences to summarize the chapter.
The thing that strikes me the most about political/economic action initiatives
is

LE S S O N
WORLD WILDLIFE FOUNDATION

For nearly 60 years, WWF has worked to help people and

nature thrive. As the world’s leading conservation
organization, WWF works in more than 100 countries. At
every level, we collaborate with people around the world to
develop and deliver innovative solutions that protect
communities, wildlife, and the places in which they live.

ADVOCACIES
For Nature, For People, Forever
WWF works to help local communities conserve the natural resources they
depend upon; transform markets and policies toward sustainability; and protect
and restore species and their habitats. Our efforts ensure that the value of nature
is reflected in decision-making from a local to a global scale. WWF connects
cutting- edge conservation science with the collective power of our partners in the
field, more than one million supporters in the United States and five million
globally, as well as partnerships with communities, companies, and governments.
Today, human activities put more pressure on nature than ever before, but
it’s also people who have the power to change this trajectory. Together, we can
address the greatest threats to life on this planet and protect the natural resources
that sustain and inspire us.
Our work is focused around six ambitious goals:

 CLIMATE - Create a climate resilient and zero-carbon world powered by

renewable energy
 FOOD – Double net availability; freeze its footprints.
 FORESTS – Conserve the world’s most important forests.
 FRESHWATER – Secure water for people and nature.
 OCEANS – Safeguard healthy oceans and marine livelihoods.
 WILDLIFE – Protect the world’s most important species.

Wildlife Conservation
 Saving nature is at the very heart of what we do as WWF. For nearly 60
years, we have made it our mission to find solutions that save the marvelous array
of life on our planet by applying the best science available and working closely with
local communities. But our work is far from done. Humans are behind the current
rate of species extinction, which is at least 100–1,000 times higher than nature
intended. We’ve seen an astonishing 60% decline in the size of populations of
mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians in just over 40 years, according to
WWF's Living Planet Report 2018. And the impacts will reach far beyond the
potential cultural loss of iconic species like tigers, rhinos and whales. And the
impacts will reach far beyond the potential cultural loss of iconic species like
tigers, rhinos and whales.

Photo credits to: wwwfcentral.ca

Photo credits to: Brent Stirton/Reportage

for Getty Images/WWF

The good news is we’ve also seen what’s working. WWF has been part of
successful wildlife recovery stories ranging from southern Africa’s black rhino to
black bucks in the Himalayas. And this, in turn, is helping to protect rich and
varied ecosystems while ensuring people continue to benefit from nature. This
much is clear: we cannot afford to fail in our mission to save a living planet.

How WWF is helping threatened species adapt to climate change

JASON HOLLEY/WWF-US
Climate change-related threats to biodiversity are not decades, or even years,
away. In recent assessments, the International Union for Conservation of Nature
(IUCN) emphasized the alarming impact of climate change on species right now:
short tail nurse sharks are threatened due to coral reef bleaching and degradation;
imperial parrot habitats are being destroyed by increasingly violent hurricanes; and
many Australian freshwater fish species are in danger from extreme droughts
caused by declining rainfall. As habitats change, extreme weather events increase,
and temperature rise, we need tools to help biodiversity adapt.
One forward-looking model is WWF’s Wildlife Adaptation Innovation Fund,
which implements on-the-ground projects—such as building artificial mounds that
serve as refuges for one-horned rhinos during severe flooding—to help wildlife
become more resilient to climate change. Another is Climate Crowd, which uses
crowd-sourced data to better understand climate change’s effects and develop
community-informed adaptation solutions in rural areas. These efforts recognize the
threat that climate change poses to both humans and wildlife, and they function to
help us all adapt to a rapidly changing world.

Conserve the world’s most important forests.

 The dawn chorus of birds singing, monkeys howling, frogs calling and
insects buzzing. The crystal clear waterfalls that are perfect for a refreshing
afternoon swim. Fireflies illuminating trees at night. The beauty and tranquility of
forests all over the world—from tropics to the tundra—inspire all of us. We know
that eight out of 10 species found on land live in forests. Approximately 750 million
people, including 60 million Indigenous people, live in forests, too.
But threats to the world’s forests are growing. Expanding agriculture, due to
an increased population and shifts in diet, is responsible for most of the world’s
deforestation. Illegal and unsustainable logging, usually resulting from the demand
for cheap wood and paper, is responsible for most of the degradation of the world’s
forests—the largest threat to the world’s forests. In degraded forests, small trees,
bushes and plants often are severely damaged or dead; rivers are polluted; slopes
are eroded; and more. The threats are so severe that we are losing huge swathes of
forests at an alarming rate. The Amazon, the planet’s largest rain forest, lost at
least 17% of its forest cover in the last half century due to human activity—mainly
clearing trees to create new or larger farms and ranches.
WWF is working to address the threats to forests: By 2020, we must conserve
the world’s forests to sustain nature’s diversity, benefit our climate and support
human well-being. Most of WWF’s work is being done in tropical rain forests, which
are the most biologically diverse and complex forests on Earth—forests in the
Amazon, the Congo Basin, the Greater Mekong and other regions near the equator.
But it also is taking place in temperate regions, such as the Russian Far East and
the United States.
The Alyansa Tigil Mina (ATM) is a coalition of organizations and groups who
have decided to collectively challenge the aggressive promotion of large-scale mining
in the Philippines. Composed of Non-Government Organizations, People’s
Organizations, Church groups and academic institutions, the ATM is both an
advocacy group and a people’s movement, working in solidarity to protect Filipino
communities and natural resources that are threatened by large-scale mining
operations.

THE ALYANSA TIGIL MINA

The Alyansa Tigil Mina was
born out of the collective concern of
Non- Government Organizations,
People’s Organizations and other
Civil Society Groups against the
impending threat of the revitalization
of the mining industry in the
Philippines.
2004, In mid-
NGOs/POs, decided to
disengage from a series of
consultations convened by the DENR
regarding the revitalization of the Photo credits to: pulitzercenter.org
mining industry. An assessment of
the situation with the aid of Indigenous Peoples support organizations and anti-
mining advocates, the decision was made that a watchdog-type organization was
needed, much like the Bantay-Mina coalition of the late 1990s. Specifically, the
group was worried that the pro-mining machineries (the industry itself, media
and the
government and its agencies) were gaining ground in the promotion of mining as
their claims, and roadshows and promotional materials were passing without
challenge. Alyansa Tigil Muna became the challenge to the official line of thinking
about mining.

The advocacies of the Alyansa Tigil Mina

 Scrapping of the Philippine Mining Act of 1995 and the Passage of an

Alternative People’s Mining Act.
 Revocation EO 270-A and the rejection of the National Minerals Action Plan.
 A nationwide moratorium on large-scale mining operations.

Sustainable or Responsible Mining

“Responsible Mining” is the current term applied to the framework of the
government for the revitalization of the mining industry. This was a modification of
the “Sustainable Mining” approach being espoused by the Mines, Minerals and
Sustainable Development (MMSD) paradigm at the international level.
However, global environmental groups successfully debunked the
concept of
“Sustainable Mining” forcing the industry
to replace
Mining.” it with the
The framework of term: “Responsible
Responsible
Photo credits to: cnnphilippines.com
OPEN PIT MINING in
Mining is very impressive. However, Mindanao
what is not easily apparent is that there
has yet to be any large-scale mining
operation that has completed the whole
cycle of the model yet. What the model
provides areof best practices from
examples
DIFFERENT and VARIOUS operations
happening in DIFFERENT countries. The
model has not been successfully closed
or “looped-in” in one single mining
operation in a specific area.
In our own analysis, the concept of
responsible mining is a weak model,
because:

 It relies on the voluntary

compliance of large-scale mining
companies.
 It highly depends on the ability of the government to enforce/ implement
safeguards articulated in national laws.
 It does not address the issue of corporate and state graft and corruption, a
scenario that is not uncommon in extractive industries or third world
countries.
 There is only token recognition of safeguards such as the participatory
decision making process, the free prior and informed consent process, the
Environmental Impact Assessment, Environmental Compliance Certificate
and so on.
Alternatives to Large-Scale Mining
There are alternatives to large scale mining first is the agro-industrialization.
The nature of the Philippine economy is largely agricultural with a high potential for
agro-industrialization. This, in fact, was the main strategy outlined in the 1987
Constitution – which promoted first the social justice and asset reform agenda –
towards national industrialization. The threat of large-scale mining operations
endanger existing sustainable livelihoods in an area. Agro-forestry in Kasibu, Nueva
Vizcaya, more than 700 hectares of citrus orchards in Malabing Valley are
threatened by the Didipio Gold and Copper Project. Farmers earn 1 million pesos
per hectare from these citrus farms. It is highly doubtful that the mining operation
will give the same benefits. This same model of agroforestry has been successfully
replicated in Bukidnon.

Eco-tourism and Watershed Development

The Samar Island Biodiversity Project (SIBP) has established that in the long-
term (over 25 years) the benefits of ecotourism, fisheries, water use and agriculture
development will actually bring more benefits to the three Samar provinces than
the proposed open pit bauxite mine. This data has been used to pressure the
DENR to create the Samar Island National Park. In the same vein, the collective
resistance of Oriental Mindoro for the entry of Crew Minerals for the Mindoro
Nickel Project, has actually resulted in improved agricultural production and
higher productivity of Lake Naujan. Sibuyan Island, Romblon has been described
as the biodiversity equivalent of the Galapagos Islands, and mere hours from
Manila. Yet instead of becoming a focus for “green tourism” the interior of the
island is set to be an open pit mine.

Fisheries / Coastal Resource Development

In an archipelagic country like the Philippines, coastal resources provide

much of the protein requirements of the people, and mining threatens the health of
the seas. Rapu-rapu is an example of fisheries resources tossed to the wayside – a
series of spills at the mine set off a poison scare that devastated the area’s fishing
industry. The mine eventually went bankrupt and closed, while the fishing industry
continued on.

ACTIVITY

If you were an environmentalist, specifically what environmental issue would

you like to address. Create a specific activity or program that will help empowering
your fellow youth to get involve in addressing environmental issues. Use the
following template to make your proposal.

Program/Activity Title

Issue to be Addressed
 Objectives

Description of the
Program

W R A P –U P

Before we end up with Module 9 let us see how much you’ve learned
from to last topics. In your own opinion, how can we protect, conserve, and
restore our environment? You can further assess your answer by citing a
situation showing those actions.

VALU I N G

We are fortunate to have this abundant blessings that we can get from the
environment for survival. We are ask to be a good steward of the environment so
that, the next generation after such generation will benefit as well from the
environment. We are challenged to make an initiated actions that we must do in
order to continue protecting, conserving and restoring the environment not only for
our wn enefit but for the welfare and common good.

POSTTEST

Direction: Identify the institution corresponds to each statement.

Write only the letter that corresponds to your choice of answer.
A. World Wildlife Foundation B. Climate Crowd
C. National Minerals Action Plan D. Alyansa Tigil Mina
 E. International Union for Conservation of Nature

1. Uses crowd-source data to better understanding climate change’s effects.

2. Exposed the true intent of government in promoting the minerals industry
3. It emphasized the alarming impact of climate change on species right now.
4. Collaborate with people around the world to develop innovative solutions that
protect communities, wildlife, and the places in which they live.
5. A coalition of organizations and groups who have decided to collectively
challenge the aggressive promotion of large-scale mining in the Philippines.

5. False 4. True 3.True 2. False 1. True

5. D 4. A 3.E 2. C 1. B

R E F E R E N CE S

Online Sources:

“Anti-mining Philippines”. Alyansa Tigil Mina. Accessed October 10, 2020.

https://www.alyansatigilmina.net/.

“Wildlife Conservation”. WWF Accessed October 10, 2020.

https://www.worldwildlife.org/initiatives/wildlife-conservation.