THE government is carrying out a cumulative impact assessment on the Manila Bay Reclamation to determine its effects to the environment, Environment Secretary Maria Antonia Yulo-Loyzaga said on Tuesday.
In a media briefing, Yulo-Loyzaga was asked by reporters about President Ferdinand R, Marcos Jr.’s position on the Manila Bay Reclamation after several groups urged the chief executive to unconditionally revoke all Environmental Compliance Certificates (ECCs) for the Manila Bay Reclamation.
“Right now, what I have been given some latitude to do is to actually present a cumulative impact assessment of the different individual projects,” the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) chief said when asked on the President’s position, noting that the past project evaluations were done on individual basis.
“Globally po, ang practice whenever you have several projects in a single ecosystem, you need a cumulative impact assessment and so we are undertaking that.”
The DENR is using the baseline of the Manila Bay Sustainable Development Master Plan and comparing it with the technical descriptions of all the different reclamation projects in Manila Bay, she said.
The Manila Bay Sustainable Development Master Plan was contracted during the previous administration.
Complicating the matter, she said, was the Supreme Court’s decision tasking the DENR, together with other agencies, to rehabilitate Manila Bay.
“What we are concerned about is that our task in terms of implementing that mandamus, okay, is actually going to be impeded by some of these developments,” Yulo-Loyzaga pointed out.
“We have a mandamus that we need to implement, that by law, already by the decision of the Supreme Court, and we need to also now actually evaluate the cumulative impact of all of those projects together.”
Currently, the DENR secretary said they are looking at compliance for those that have already began working and also started talking to them.
Asked if they see any violation, Yulo-Loyzaga said there are ongoing discussions with at least one party, which will be called in for a technical conference to give an explanation on potential non-compliance.
