A UNIVERSITY of the Philippines geologist said the government should consider separating the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) to boost its independence and its powers of enforcement.
“It should stand on its own. You don’t have to report to someone,” said Carlo A. Arcilla, director at the Philippine Nuclear Research Institute and professor at the National Institute of Geological Studies at the University of the Philippines in Diliman.
The objective of a separate agency, Mr. Arcilla said is to “put some muscle” into the implementation of environmental law.
The EMB is mandated to monitor the environmental compliance of all projects, issuing key permits such as the environmental compliance certificate, without which no project can proceed.
“It will become very powerful in a sense. The management should be top-level scientists or honest. (Currently) the decisions come from political appointees which is, in a sense, fine as long as they have good advisers,” Mr. Arcilla added.
Mr. Arcilla noted that the DENR was formerly the Ministry of Natural Resources under the parliamentary system of government of the 1970s and 80s before it took on the function of monitoring the environment. — Janina C. Lim
