Greenpeace, Laguna youth lead clean up of Laguna de Bay
“Laguna de Bay is perhaps the country’s most important freshwater body and should be protected to meet the needs of future generations. Besides the visible garbage and rubbish from our daily lives that is indiscriminately dumped here, Laguna lake is also under severe threat from less visible but more dangerous toxic pollutants from the industrial sector,” said Beau Baconguis, Campaign Manager, Greenpeace Southeast Asia. “Increasing demand combined with the vagaries of hydrological patterns due to climate change a global fresh water crisis is looming ahead of us, as it is experts have predicted the death of Laguna in next five years if we do not implement measures to protect it now,” she added.
More than 16 million people rely on Laguna Lake for food, water and livelihood, but its water quality is severely compromised by pollution. Industrial pollution from factories, domestic and municipal sewage, agricultural runoff and waste dumps are among the lake’s most blatant sources of toxic pollution. Around five hundred Greenpeace Water Patrol volunteers and youth from Laguna Province led a clean up of floating trash in and around Laguna de Bay on World Coastal Clean Up Day today. The clean up was conducted even as the volunteers called on concerned government agencies to also protect Laguna Lake from less visible but more dangerous chemical and organic pollutants.
“Laguna Lake is a treasure of the province of Laguna that is why our youth saw the need to help protect it, starting with their participation in today’s global clean up. We want this to be the beginning of a longer term engagement of Laguna’s youth, as part of the Water Patrol to conserve and protect Laguna Lake,” said Fatima Villaseñor, Head of the Youth Development Affairs Office of the Province of Laguna.
The clean up, which marks the start of a partnership between the Greenpeace Water Patrol and the Youth Development Affairs Office of the Provincial Government of Laguna, was conducted in the towns of Siniloan, Sta. Cruz, and Calamba, Laguna. Greenpeace Water Patrol activists onboard rubber boats and kayaks collected floating trash in the water while Laguna youth gathered waste on the shore.
Single-use or disposable plastics are expected to be the main culprit. An audit of the collected waste will be conducted by the EcoWaste Coalition to determine the amount and kinds of plastic which end up in Laguna de Bay. After auditing, the waste will be delivered to the Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) of the City of Calamba.
Laguna Lake is currently the focus of Greenpeace’s ‘Project Clean Water.’ In April and August this year, Greenpeace Water Patrol exposed how Laguna Lake has been turning into a rubbish bin with waste dumps reclaiming the lake’s shores.
Greenpeace launched ‘Project Clean Water’ in October 2007 with the aim to bring people together toward a common goal of safeguarding our water sources, and to catalyze much-needed action to reverse the continuing decline of our country’s water resources.
