Nickel Asia expends P8.5M worth of seedlings for greening programs
FOR 2022 alone, Nickel Asia Corp. (NAC) has recorded 234,823 trees planted within its mining camps and has donated 185,466 seedlings to the Department of Natural Resources (DENR) in support of the government’s National Greening Program (NGP).
President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr. recently issued a challenge to plant more trees as one way of countering the threat of climate change. NAC has proven to be in on this year after year.
The Philippine Mining Act of 1995 obliged mining companies to plant 100 trees to replace every tree they cut due to their operations. This was part of the mining industry’s rehabilitation program, embedded in the Mining Act and the mining companies’ commitment to the greening of communities where they operated.
Above and beyond what the law required, NAC and its subsidiaries have taken serious participation in NGP programs by generating seedlings with the help of the communities and by donating thousands of them to DENR.
The past year has seen an increase of requests for seedlings of fruitbearing trees, which were much more expensive to generate as compared to seedlings for forest trees.
“The people in the communities are more interested in fruit bearing trees to plant in NGP-identified areas,” said Jomer Tiamson, a forester and environmental manager for Hinatuan Mining Corp., a subsidiary of NAC, based in Tagana-an, Surigao del Norte.
Tiamson explained that it further proved NAC’s commitment to the greening programs because the cost of generating a seedling for a forest tree was P10 pesos each while a seedling for a fruit tree cost P30.