This is in regard to Ferdinand Cruz's letter of resignation from the MAC on December 15, 2002. First I must clairify that it is not old news. It is a crises that has been building for the past two years that the MAC Certification program has been underway in the Philippines. I wrote a paper with Ferdinand Cruz that was published in the OFI Journal ( Ornamental Fish International) in October 2002 titled "Net-Training to CAMP: Community-Based Programmes That Benefit Coral Reef Conservation And The Aquarium Trade". The paper outlines the history of the net-trainings by both the Haribon Foundation for the Conservation of Natural Resources and the International Marinelife Alliance (IMA). In the article I outlined the MAC feasability study (FS) conducted in 2001 and the creation of Collection Area Management Plans (CAMPs) during 2002 as they relate to the MAC Core Standards, particularly those for Collecion, Holding, and Transport (CHT) and Ecosystem and Fisheries Management (EFM). I also explained how they fitted in with the new Philippines Fisheries Act of 1998 and decentralized management by local government units (LGUs) which are the municipalities charged with managing municipal waters out to 15 km from shore. Basically, our article was supportive of the MAC. So what went wrong?
I obtained the CAMP documents for two municipalities where Ferdinand Cruz had conducted FS and CAMPs. The first deals with the CAMP prepared by the Net-Collectors of the municipality of Palauig, in the Province of Zambales. The second dealt with the Net-Collectors Group Collection Area Management Plan for the municipality of Busuanga situated on the Island of Busuanga in the Calamian Group in Northeastern Palawan. Both documents show a tremendous amount of work by Ferdinand, the collectors, and the MAC training team. In Ferdinand's letter he indicates he spent 6 months at each site. The collectors must buy into the concept of sustainably managing their marine resources. Underwater surveys werre conducted to document the health of the reefs, the abundance of the fish species and their species diversity. The MAC Core standards requires that a plan be prepared by the Collectors Area Management Committee in conjunction with a Non-Collectors Advisory Committee. In the CAMPs for these two municipalities all of this is thoroughly conducted. Then, the plans were reviewed by the municipal government through the Fisheries and Aquatic Resource Management Councils (FARMCs).
I also had the opportunity to review the many forms that collectors were required to fill out to view the lists of species available at each site studied
during the FS. When I had a draft manuscript of our paper, I sent it to Paul Holthus for review. He replied that I had failed to mention other CAMP sites near the Island of Bohol. This came as quite a surprise to me since I had spent over a month gathering information from many sources including Lino Alvarez and David Vosseler of the MAC, as well as others like Marivi Laurel and Ferdinand Cruz and none of them had mentioned these other CAMP sites. The other sites where CAMP training has been conducted include Batasan Island in the municipality of Tubigon, the municipality of Clarin (both near the Island of Bohol), Bagac in the province of Bataan, and the muncipality of Coron (on the Island of Busuanga).
Ferdinand's letter expressed frustration with the fact that the muncipalities of Tubigon (village of Batasan), and Clarin were certified by the MAC during November 2002, while the municipalities where he conducted his work (Palauig and Busuanga) still have not been certified. Why is it that two muncipalities that did everything outlined in the MAC CHT and EFM core standards were not certified, while Tubigon and Clarin were certified?
The latter two municipalities were trained and had CAMPs prepared under the supervision of Lino Alvarez (the MAC-Philippines Coordinator). Ferdinand's letter indicates the CAMPs for these two municipalities were incomplete and were prepared in a period a few months. According to Ferdinand's letter "Batasan, Bohol had a simple Collection Area Management PLan with large wordings of "to be filled up" showing that it is an unfinished management plan yet it was quickly certified with no problems." Some MAC staff objected to this to Lino Alvarez but nothing was done. It appears that the MAC falsely certified these sites (e.g., Batasan and Clarin do not meet either the CHT or the EFT core standards). The collectors did not have barrier nets. Yet, the sites were certified.
Another issue is that the reefs close to these muncipalities are degraded, and have a low fish diversity. For example the MAC FS indicates that there were only 22 species of marine aquarium fish observed at Batasan Island in 2001. Apparently, Aquarium Habitat only receives about 12 species from Batasan Island (municpality of Tubigon). In comparison, Palauig, Zambales was found to have 46 species of interest to the aquarium trade.in the MAC FS document.
Several people have informed me that ReefCheck did an underwater survey (to evaluate MAQTRAC underwater survey methods) at Batasan Island and considered the site "unsustainable". Yet the MAC chose to ignore these data, and went ahead and certified the site. Despite several requests for the Batasan Island CAMP document, I have not been able to obtain it from the MAC. Ferdinand's letter indicates that the Batasan Island CAMP document is incomplete and does not justify certification of the site.
So my question is why is it that the MAC certified Tubigon (village of Batasan) and Clarin which don't appear to meet MAC Core Standards, while not certifying Palauig and Busuanga? The MAC owes us a detailed explanation.
Sincerely,
Peter J. Rubec, Ph.D.
Without any collectors supporting them, the cyanide test will be worthless. I have dealt with MAC for a very long time and have been made all kinds of promises about what they're "working on". I truly hope they are sincere this time and am giving them the benefit of the doubt (for the last time) on the cyanide test. But I'm not going to sit back and get apathetic waiting to hear some good news. As the news breaks, I'll report it. Whether it be good or bad.
