Butuan City – Police personnel under the City Mobile Force Company (CMFC) on Thursday took part in the mangrove planting activity here collaborating with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in the environmental awareness campaign.
“Since most of our police officers are engaged in the peace and order mission, what we have assigned to our mangrove planting are those under the CMFC. Our activity is just part of several activities related to the environmental protection awareness campaign of the Philippine National Police (PNP) under what we refer to as the 2030 Roadmap,” explained Police Chief Inspector Christian L. Rafols II, CMFC assistant company commander.
Rafols stressed that the PNP is geared not only in promoting and ensuring peace and order, but is also into caring for the environment.
“The Butuan City Police Office (BCPO) has had several activities geared toward environmental awareness. We even had several projects like waste management through segregation alongside the distribution of trash bins in schools. Aside from mangrove planting, we also plant other tree species in other parts of the city,” he said.
Rafols noted that added that several more environmental awareness campaigns will be pushed by BCPO as it has become apparent that the affects of climate change are affecting river and coastal communities in Butuan City.
CMFC, formerly known as the City Public Safety Company, mobilized 25 of its organic personnel during the mangrove planting activity.
Norman Asugan, Community Environment and Natural Resources Officer (CENRO) explained that the PNP team was provided with the seedlings: “We had around 1,000 seedlings of the so-called bakhaw babae (Rhizophora mucronata) to be planted as part of the DENR national greening program and rehabilitation of mangroves. This partnership with our law enforcement agency is significant as the police would be a great help in our push for better environmental awareness,” said Asugan.
Shirley Reyes, barangay chairperson of Lumbocan expressed her optimism for the planting of mangrove in their coastal barangay.
“As a coastal village divided by the ocean and the mighty Agusan River, we appreciate the mangrove planting as a huge help to our community. Our Bantay Dagat program has been guarding the planted areas for a while now, and we do acknowledge the need to secure these areas from those who would cut and harvest the older, more established mangroves.
“Having the PNP helping us here would be a great deterrent against those who would threaten our environmental conservation effort,” said Reyes.