Forest Defined

The Forest Management Bureau (FMB) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) defines “forest” as land with an area of more than 0.5 hectare and tree crown cover1 (or equivalent stocking level) of more than 10 percent. The trees should be able to reach a minimum height of 5 meters at maturity in situ (original position / location). A forest consists of either closed forest formations where trees of various storeys and undergrowth cover a high proportion of the ground or open forest formations with a continuous vegetation cover in which tree crown cover exceeds 10 percent. Young natural stands and all plantations established for forestry purposes, which have yet to reach a crown density of more than 10 percent or tree height of 5 meters are included under forest.

Forest Cover in the Philippines

“In 1934, forests comprised more than half (57%) of the country’s total land area. In 2010, the forest cover has gone down to 23 percent or about 6.8 million hectares mainly due to increasing agricultural and housing needs, commercial and illegal logging, and kaingin  (charcoal making) and forest fires.  The extensive deforestation and degradation are brought about by the inequitable land distribution, insecure tenure and rural poverty in the country.

The issuance of Executive Order No. 23 on February 1st, 2011, declared a moratorium on the cutting and harvesting of timber in natural and residual forests nationwide. While it substantially reduced the illegal logging hotspots in the country, it may have also resulted in the loss of public revenues, incomes and employment in the logging industry. With the imposition of the log ban, subsistence upland dwellers may also have swarmed the forests and indiscriminately cut trees as concessionaires abandoned the areas they once protected.  Intensive quantitative and qualitative impact analyses of EO 23 along with other policies should be conducted to see whether or not these policies should be continued, amended or abolished (Israel, 2013).

In the Senate of the 16th Congress, a number of legislative measures were filed to protect and develop the forestry sector. Nine bills (Senate Bill Nos. 30, 45, 520, 531, 675, 1093, 1094, 1644, and 2200) are filed on sustainable forest management and on tree planting, five bills (SBNs 142, 171, 769, 1308 and 2237) on mangrove forest protection and preservation, four bills (SBNs 604, 786, 1101 and 1900) on delineating specific forest limits, and the substitute bill (SBN 2712) on the proposed Expanded NIPAS Act of 2015 providing for the sustainable development and management of protected areas in the country. The enactment of these legislative proposals would help in the protection, conservation, utilization, development and sustainable management of the country’s forest resources.

The passage of a national land use policy (SBNs 7, 53 and 150), which has long been proposed, is also warranted to address deforestation activities. The overlapping and conflicting national laws on land use results in the competing uses of forest resources without regulation. Hence, it is high time to rationalize land use planning in the country and put in order the national laws on land uses (such as prime agricultural land, agrarian reform, protected areas, ancestral domain, fisheries, forestry, mining and housing) that are sector specific.”

Source: https://www.senate.gov.ph/publications/SEPO/AAG%20on%20Philippine%20Forest_Final.pdfhttps://www.senate.gov.ph/publications/SEPO/AAG%20on%20Philippine%20Forest_Final.pdf