BY: ROI ANTHONI B. LOMOTAN
DUMAGUETE CITY, Apr. 22 (PIA) – The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in Negros Oriental plans to tie up with a local state university to monitor the implementation of National Greening Program (NGP) in the province.
Provincial Environment and Natural Resources Officer (PENRO) Charlie Fabre disclosed that there are talks with Negros Oriental State University (NORSU) President Dr. Vicente Real about a possible three-year partnership with the institution.
If the plan pushes through, Fabre explained that for the first year of the tie up, NORSU students will participate in the tree-planting activity in sites identified by the DENR.
On the second year, another set of students will go to these sites and check on the survival of these plants. On the third year, another set of students will again go to these sites to monitor and ensure the growth of these plants.
Aside from these, NORSU students will also monitor how the department implements the NGP and the impact of NGP in the environment and in nearby communities.
“We want to make sure that there will be a third party that will monitor if DENR is successful in its program,” Fabre said.
For its part, the DENR will provide the technical and financial support in the conduct of their study.
Fabre hopes that they could enter an agreement with NORSU by May this year.
Fabre disclosed this in an interview after an Earth Day Forum held in NORSU earlier today where one of the key points discussed was the status of the implementation of the National Greening Program in Negros Oriental.
Fabre noted that for the past three years 24,000 hectares of land in the province has been covered by the NGP. The overall land target to be covered by the NGP in Negros Oriental is at 42, 500 hectares. For this year, about 12,000 hectares of land are aimed to be included in the NGP.
“This year, our target initially is 7,000 hectares but it increased to 12, 000 hectares because the regional office learned that the local government officials here are supportive to the program so they thought that it would be good to expand (the land areas),” Fabre said.
With this, Fabre said his agency expects that there will be an increase in the total land coverage of the NGP in the province up to 50,000 hectares. Still, Fabre remains positive that DENR will still be able to reach the target by 2016.
Most of the identified sites for the NGP in Negros Oriental are in Bayawan City, Sta. Catalina, Ayungon and Tayasan towns.
Meanwhile, the Earth Day Forum in NORSU also focused on campaigning environmental conservation to students of the university. There was a lecture on climate change given by other DENR representative.
“What I want from them is to absorb the message about situation of planet Earth so they can also be agent to other sector and bring information so that they should make contribution in preserving the environment,” Fabre challenged the NORSU students. (mbcn/RAL/PIA7-NEGOR)