Rethinking the reality of the forest in the Cordillera

IT begins in the mind, a thought. We may yet create landscapes with trees but without the forest. Say that is imagination. I wish it is a reality already in the making.

The reality is that in spite of our efforts to reforest the landscape, the forest is not growing. It is not expanding.

The reality is that the forest is no longer there anymore.

I do not know if the various definitions of forest, textbook or otherwise, are real or imagined. Current literature and discussions of the forest are expressions of the reality of the forest several decades ago.

In these highlands, the forest that I have known is gone. What is objectively observable is a tree cover in some given mountain terrains, here and there, with human settlements and their farms in between.

It is quite confusing to talk about the forest these days – the reality.

The expansive forest that I have known, where deer and wildlife roam and migrate uninterrupted from one mountain range to another, hidden under thick shrubbery and trees, has long been chopped-up, its scattered parts and limbs, like islands in the seas, is all we got.

The chopped up forest cannot support wildlife. Their migration, under the given conditions, is risky and dangerous to them. Like islands in dangerous waters, the scattered parts and limbs of the forest are also populated by lonely trees, shrubs, ferns, some ghosts or remnants of their great colonies that supported the existence of a species of birds or some creeping or climbing creatures that are all extinct in situ after their abodes were logged, or continuously burned, if not totally cleared for farming and housing purposes.

If the forest is no longer there and its choppedup parts are what we got, what must we do?

Well, we can continue imagining we can bring the forest back, as we have been doing all these years. Perhaps, like what the U.S. Government did to the Florida Everglades, our government will do it for us. That is possible if it will relocate the population of the Cordillera to other places. That is not possible even in a thousand years.

Meanwhile, in a recent discussion with Mr. Geraldo Banawa, Regional Corn Program Coordinator of the Cordillera Administrative Region, we saw how our farmers continue to transform the landscapes of the region.

It is rather urgent to revisit the agroforestry practices employed by our farmers throughout the decades and see if we can refine, enhance and give voice to what is already on the map as good survival practices.

A landscape cleared of trees, for instance, planted to crops like corn leads to thought-provoking situations, like continuous erosion, yield reduction through time, increase in temperature and microclimate change. It is hard to think of landscapes without trees.

And it is not really possible to improve agricultural livelihoods without trees. What should we do?

The local citizenry would do well to retain the old forest with its remnants of trees belonging to a wide range of plant families, such as grasses, conifers, including ferns. They can care for and manage these forest plants but restricted to the edges of fields, even settlements to provide shade, or planted to create a more pleasant environment around houses.

In the farms, especially along mountain slopes, caring for trees including new varieties with their multiple uses as fertilizer, feed for livethe stock, fuel, and as a hedge to conserve soil for agroforestry will benefit them in a myriad of economic, educational, and aesthetic purposes.

For corn, Mr. Banawa is promoting the planting of Madre de cacao as hedges and feed for livestock. Used as a hedge, following sloping agricultural land technology (SALT) strategy, the tree when well managed provides feed for a variety of livestock to include poultry, ruminants, and swine. In effect, this will increase the income of farmers.

We cannot just plan and build settlements or farms without providing spaces for fauna and flora – for a variety of trees and plants to coexist with us and other creatures. We cannot have a landscape in our mountains with a forest of houses.

We need to look at our landscapes in a new light. We need “old growth” and “young growth.” We can grow a “jungle” of cocoa, coffee or rubber. In some areas above the home gardens or the rice terraces, we can grow our “timber plantations” and “tree crops” adopting the “pinugo or muyong” strategies of the Ifugaos.

We need to clearly describe, grow, and manage trees according to their utility and sizes besides residential homes, on roadsides, in the farms, in empty spaces as part of us, our politics, science, and quest for quality survival.

If we are conscious of the importance of a variety of plants and animals to quality living in our mountain spaces, we need to learn how many trees will need to grow in a given space along with the rest. In which case, we are quite aware and familiar with their age, sizes, and varieties as they relate to ecosystem services and use.

The science and expertise of agroforestry has been promoting its technologies and strategies in the Cordillera for quite some time now. I would be glad to hear and trumpet its being demonstrated as a successful economic enterprise and livelihood by a number of farmers for more farmers to adopt. -30-