Connecting People with Nature: Environmental Activist Study Tour of
Population, Health and Environmental Integrated Programs in the Philippines
by Caron Whitaker

The National Wildlife Federation works to maintain and increase funding for international family planning, to help improve the lives of people around the world, and to reduce population pressures on nature.

My experiences in the Philippines have revealed to me the urgency with which these connected issues need to be addressed. … The successes I witnessed in the Philippines because of integrated Population, Health and Environmental programs makes [sustainable development] real and most importantly attainable. I can now bring this positive message to the citizens of the United States. … We are discovering what works, now we must secure its future.
– Cheryl Johncox, NWF Activist

In March 2006, NWF activists Cheryl Johncox, Paul Beaudette and myself had the opportunity to travel to the Philippines to visit conservation projects that were integrated with reproductive and general health projects. We were part of a group of environmental activists from four US organizations on a trip and one representative from Kiribati. The trip was sponsored and organized by Save the Children-Philippines and Population Reference Bureau.

Wow, What a trip! The opportunity to see and speak to people who had changed their lives and the future of their community through such programs inspired and impressed us.  Volunteers and community members showed us how protecting and restoring natural resources and having access to reproductive health care improves their quality of life for this generation and the next.  This article tells you a little about what we saw, while the reports from Paul and Cheryl will give you a sense of what we learned and felt.

Urban Manila

We visited three sites where conservation work was integrated with reproductive and general health care, economic development and education. The first site was an urban neighborhood in Manila. This neighborhood housed 113,000 people with several thousand living in shanties on 97 acres on the banks of the Pasig River in Manila.  When the project started in 1993, the river was so full of solid waste that you couldn’t even see the water, just piles of garbage and solid waste. The shanty community was full of sick children suffering from the smell and constant infections. At that time, the population only had one health center far away from the shanties.

In 1993 the Kapatiran Komundad People’s Coalition, a coalition of local leaders, started a campaign to improve the lives of people along the river. They started: a recycling program where families were paid for recyclables, trash collection, a youth theater company and built two health clinics and a school. The result has been more than a 50 percent reduction of solid waste in the river and the community, an improvement in health, increased school enrollment, increased economic opportunities- especially for women, and stronger community bonds. The community still suffers from poverty, but they also exude pride in the work they have done. The teenagers in the theater group do street performances on social and environmental issues and are following their aspirations for a better life.  Now, with the completion of their grant from the government of Denmark, the program is doing its best to invest in the health and environmental services.

It was not a matter of not wanting better, not caring or just expecting to be given anything. A woman was scrubbing her steps to a shanty as we walked past and her smile said a lot of her self-respect. …These are not people who don’t care- these are people who refuse to accept environmental injustice and pollution. They have brought family planning into their community because they see how larger family size reduces their quality of life. Given the chance to improve their status, bring health care to their children and improve their environment, the community around the PasigRiver has brought PHE to the streets and neighborhoods for all their benefit.
– Paul Beaudette, NWF Board Member

Gilutongan Island fishing community

Our second site was a fishing village off the island of Cebu. In this small fishing village the community is trying to feed its growing human population on smaller and smaller fish catches. With the help of Path International and Coastal Conservation Education Foundation, this community has invested in a marine protected area, seaweed farming, a water delivery system, a government health center and trained community family planning workers.  The people on this island realize that a growing population is not sustainable and state that they use family planning in order to help save the fishery by slowing population growth.  In the three and a half years this program has been running the average age of first childbirth has increased three years, from 12 to 15.

I hope to be able to bring the message of the people on the Gilutangan Island Marine Sanctuary that integration of family health, environmental/marine sanctuary and family planning works. Toti, the sanctuary guardian on the island, showed us how improving the sanctuary added to the livelihood of the people, and [combined with] smaller family sizes the islanders were seeing a better, sustainable life for themselves.
– Paul Beaudette, NWF Board Member

Cabacnitan agricultural community

Our final site was the community of Cabacnitan on the island of Bohol. Roughly half of the people in this community live within a natural protected area.  In 2003 the community worked with World Neighbors to determine what their priorities were. On the top of the list was low income which they connected to lack of reproductive health care and water shortages among other issues. Over three years they built two water systems - one for drinking water, and a fish pond from which they use the water for agricultural and domestic needs.  They built a health center and created a community cooperative to build a store and invest in other income generating projects. One such project was to train women as mid wives and health care providers. World Neighbors and other supporting organizations have left, but this community has continued its services on its own through financing local cooperatives.

At each site visit we witnessed pride and successes, because of integrated Population, Health and Environment programs, each community shared their stories of improvements made, rivers saved, fish stocks restored, income generated, maternal and infant death decrease, and birth rate reduction. They spoke of how important it was that their children were healthy and fed, and of the link between a healthy environment and their own health, both must be addressed if they are going to reach for prosperity.  
– Cheryl Johncox, NWF activist

Conclusion

Our goal on this trip was to see first had how population, health and environment are integrated and to be able to speak from the heart about the links between population and environment. Here’s what our activists had to say about what they learned.

We cannot afford to wait [to]... bring these issues into mainstream society. The earth, its creatures and the two billion people living on less than two dollars a day can not afford to wait. Because of my trip to the Philippines, I now feel more prepared, equipped and inspired to deliver this message.
– Cheryl Johncox, NWF activist

Through this effort I can now discuss with some reality how combining/integrating the PHE program is a win/win situation as I argue for continued funding of international family planning programs.
– Paul Beaudette, NWF Board member

Other participating organizations included Audubon, Izaak Walton League of America and Sierra Club.

Special thanks to Population Reference Bureau and Save the Children Philippines for their work organizing this trip, and to the Packard Foundation for their support of the P&E work in the Philippines as well as the organizations sponsoring the trip, NWF and the other organizations with activists on the trip.