Aquino orders coastlines off limits to homes
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Congress plans to provide aid to rehabilitate typhoon-hit areas
Philippine President Benigno Aquino III has ordered Environment Secretary Ramon Paje to keep coastlines off limits to homes after huge waves spawned by Super Typhoon Yolanda swamped seaside villages in central Philippines.
At the same time, Congress is proposing to give Aquino at least 55 billion pesos (Bt39.6 billion) to rehabilitate typhoon-wrecked areas.
Given the huge cost of rehabilitation, the Senate and the House of Representatives are also seeking to authorise agencies to spend 21 billion pesos in calamity funds in 2013 until the end of next year.
This is on top of the 14.6-billion-peso supplemental budget in 2013 and the 20-billion-peso rehabilitation fund in the 2014 budget earlier proposed by the Senate to deal with the aftermath of Yolanda and past storms.
As the government grappled with the aftermath of what was believed to be the most powerful storm to hit land, the president directed Paje to draw up a comprehensive programme on environment protection against storm surges, flooding and landslides.
“Part of the president’s directive to the DENR [Department of Environment and Natural Resources] is to establish ‘no-build zones’ on coastlines to ensure the transfer of residents to safe resettlement areas,” Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr said over radio.
In the country, the “easement” or setback from the shoreline high-water mark is currently at 20 metres. In other countries in the Pacific, the easement is from 50m to 200m, according to environmental planners.
An archipelago with more than 7,000 islands, the Philippines has one of the world’s longest shorelines at 36,289 kilometres, data from the National Statistical Coordination Board show.
When it tore through central Philippines on November 8, Yolanda spawned huge waves of 5 metres to 7 metres, destroying homes, buildings and crops in its path and reducing many areas into a virtual wasteland.
Residents of seaside villages in Tacloban City in Leyte, Samar and other nearby provinces bore the brunt of the typhoon’s fury.
Yolanda left in its wake at least 5,235 dead and 1,631 missing and destroyed 11.9 billion pesos in infrastructure and 10.5 billion pesos in agricultural products.
The government blamed local officials’ lack of preparations, the residents’ indifference to warnings and their poor understanding of the weather bureau’s advisories on storm surges for the high death toll.
The country is buffeted by an average of 20 cyclones every year. Yolanda was the 25th storm to strike the country this year.
Coloma said Filipinos should learn from the painful lessons of Yolanda.
