The participants of the Inception Meeting for the implementation of the “Ensuring Benefits from Peatlands through Protection and Wise-Use” (ESBenePeat) Project.

Quezon City, Philippines – The Biodiversity Management Bureau (BMB) conducted an Inception Meeting for the “Ensuring Benefits from Peatlands through Protection and Wise-Use” (ESBenePeat) Project on January 12, 2023 to level off understanding of the Project among key partner institutions and co-implementers and to ensure the smooth and strategic execution of the project through collaborative efforts.

The ESBenePeat Project is part of the ASEAN Regional Programme on Sustainable Use of Peatlands and Haze Mitigation in ASEAN (SUPA) Component 1, which is co-financed by the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) and European Union (EU) and is being implemented by GIZ Indonesia.

Primarily, the project aims to address the degradation of peatlands to ensure and sustain the benefits derived from it by scaling up the technical and institutional capacity of the government as well as strengthening partnerships with key stakeholders, particularly the Local Government Units and local communities. It is designed to ensure that the sustainable management of peatlands is achieved for the benefit of the affected communities and the conservation of biodiversity specifically in Leyte Sab-a in Region VIII and Agusan Marsh Wildlife Sanctuary in Region XIII.

The Inception Meeting was attended by various government agencies and non-governmental organizations who were intended to collaborate and provide complementation to the project’s objectives. Director Al O. Orolfo of the DENR – Foreign Assisted and Special Projects Service (FASPS) emphasized in his Remarks that the project initiatives, outputs, and outcomes will be the result of collaborative work towards achieving integrative peatland management as a nature-based solution to different environmental issues in the Philippines, especially transboundary haze pollution and the impacts of climate change.

“We envision that this project is just the beginning of our efforts that should be sustained as part of our regular programs in the conservation of this unique and globally important ecosystem. By that means, only then will we be contributing to global peatland conservation and at the same time promote the full benefits that our peatland ecosystems can provide” said by Dir. Natividad Y. Bernardino on her Welcome Message.