We stand united! Stop excessive logging and mining now!

The Philippines, yet again, made it to the top news of the world just before 2011 ended. With 1,453 deaths and over a hundred still declared missing, typhoon Sendong is definitely one of the deadliest natural calamity to hit the country. While it is a fact that the Philippines is a tropical country that experiences a regular slew of rains, storms and typhoons, the country is still vulnerable to such calamities.
Milenyo, Ondoy and now Sendong have claimed thousands of Filipino lives. And just last Thursday, another 25 more lives were taken(and about a hundred still missing) by another natural disaster, this time a landslide in Compostella Valley (Com.Val.) in Mindanao. These natural disasters - typhoons, landslides, etc. - are not so very “natural” at all. The downpour of rain is a natural process, but the flashfloods that came with it, is not. These floods may be caused by a number of reasons, but in the case of typhoon Sendong, it was mainly caused by too much logging/illegal logging (as seen by the thousands of logs/timber brought down by the floods from the mountains) in the mountains of Mindanao. As for the deadly landslide in Com.Val., according to the DENR, there was a crack at the top of the mountain and the mining and logging around it triggered the soil to erode.
Nature will continue with its course. Its something that we can’t do anything about. But we can definitely try to lessen its impact on us. Between issues on poverty, politics, peace, etc., we Filipinos could do away with deadly disasters. And so as a part of our social obligation, we in Sulong CARHRIHL would like to call on the people, especially those in power to:

Stop Illegal Logging, Mining and other forms of environment degradation now!

We call on the government to exercise its power and do its responsibility to prevent such disasters from happening again and for every citizen of the country to support all the efforts of the government to protect our natural resources and the lives of every Filipino. And while we understand that proper investigations regarding the incidents are taking place, we request for a moratorium on logging and mining.
Now is the time to highlight the issue of environmental protection, especially that of excessive logging/illegal logging and mining, on the peace talks. Let us not wait for another tragedy to come before we all stand united. Let us work now for a nature-friendly, better and peaceful Philippines.

Sr. Arnold Maria Noel, Ssps
Co-Chairperson, Sulong CARHRIHL