Outgoing Department of Environment and Natural Resources-Negros Island Region (DENR-NIR) director Al Orolfo poses with incumbent Director Livino Duran during the formal turn-over ceremony at the DENR-NIR Office in Bacolod City, yesterday morning. (PENRO DENR photo)
By Dominique Gabriel G. Bañaga
The Department of Environment and Natural Resources-Negros Island Region (DENR-NIR) and the city government of Bacolod have inked a memorandum of agreement to launch a massive ‘greening’ program for Bacolod City.
The program dubbed by Bacolod City Mayor Evelio Leonardia as the Bacolod City Urban Development Greening Program aims to plant over one million trees in the city alone.
In a press conference yesterday morning, Leonardia said it is one of their most ambitious projects, citing it will have a big impact for the city.
Under the signed memorandum of agreement, the project is part of the DENR’s Executive Order No. 26, which declares an interdepartmental convergence initiative for the National Greening Program (NGP).
The NGP aims to rehabilitate or restore degraded, sparsely vegetative forestland through massive reforestations and rehabilitation efforts geared towards poverty alleviation, biodiversity conservation, environmental stability, food security, and climate change mitigation.
Outgoing DENR-NIR Director Al Orolfo explained the project is also being supported by the provincial government of Negros Occidental through the Provincial Environment and Natural Resources Office (PENRO), whilst the city government is tasked with maintaining the success of the project.
Orolfo said they will also supply the city government with fruit bearing trees, with Leonardia stating he wants it planted in the relocation sites in the city.
Councilor Cindy Rojas, meanwhile, said she will author a city ordinance that will give rewards to barangays who manage a 100 percent survival rate for seedlings, while imposing fines on individuals who destroy planted trees./WDJ