KABAYAN, Benguet – The municipal government here temporarily suspended the traditional trekking activities at the Mount Pulag National Park, the second highest mountain peak in the country, to allow the implementation of proper vegetation in order to sustain the mountain’s scenery which is being frequented by thousands of foreign and domestic tourists.

In an approved resolution, the Municipal Council said there is a need for the scenic and historic tourist destination in the town to have a breather from the thousands of tourists that visit its popular summit, thus, the temporary suspension of trekking activities is part of the efforts to preserve and protect the tourist spot from further devastation.

Aside from the heavy pollution due to the unabated dumping of waste in restricted places, forest fires have also destroyed the public toilet erected along the mountain slopes which warrants the need to construct another facility to attend to the health and sanitation requirements of future tourists.

Mount Pulag is at least 11,000 feet above sea level and is approximately 80 kilometers away from Baguio City. Foreign and domestic tourists, who are nature lovers, often visit the national park to witness its unique scenery and popular forest and fauna as well as the presence of rare species of animals such as the cloud rat, among others.(Dexter See)

Relocation of 2 villages urged
SABANGAN, Mt. Province – Some 83 families from the villages of Bun-ayan and Bao-angan in this municipality are recommended for immediate relocation as their areas were identified as geologically at risk by geologists who earlier conducted a survey in the said places. 

According to Municipal Social Welfare and Development (MSWD) officer Brigette C. Mangay-at, Mines Geosciences Bureau (MGB) representatives who visited the areas certified that the two villages are indeed hazardous for the residents to continue living there.

Alarmed with the report, the local officials together with the personnel of the MSWD Office conducted consultation meetings with the residents especially the most affected families. Mangay-at said village officials identified Sitio Dawdawissan, a public communal land, as relocation site.

There are 15 families who opted to be relocated at the identified relocation area, while the other families preferred to be relocated in their own private lots. There are 28 families who chose to be resettled at Sitio Todey where their own lots are located, 17 families at Sitio Cabogbogan. (Dexter See)

RDC simplifies title issuance
BAGUIO CITY – The Regional Development Council in the Cordillera Administrative Region (RDC-CAR) issued a handbook on land tenorial instruments which resolved the conflicts and squabbles on land acquisition and ownership, especially within indigenous cultural communities in the different parts of the region.

Juan Ngalob, regional director of the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) and acting RDC-CAR chairman, explained the presence of the land tenorial instruments handbook will fast-track the implementation of Republic Act (RA) 8371 or the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA) as well as the quest of the region to achieve an autonomous status.

Cordillera is 92 percent composed of indigenous peoples while the remaining eight percent are mixture of various lowland communities.

According to Ngalob, the existence of a definite distinction among the functions of several concerned agencies will eventually ease the roadblocks and conflicts on mandates of government agencies such as the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP), Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), and Land Registration Authority (LRA). (Dexter See)