ELAC joins Pista Y ang Kagueban, plants hope for Palawan’s forests
As Palawan’s forests face continuing threats, ELAC joins Pista Y ang Kageban with a call for restoration, accountability, and community-led protection.
Together, let’s keep Palawan’s forests standing!
PUERTO PRINCESA CITY, Palawan
With seedlings in hand and mud on their shoes, staff of the Environmental Legal Assistance Center joined yesterday’s Pista Y ang Kageban, Puerto Princesa’s annual “Feast of the Forest,” taking part in a community tree-planting activity that brought together volunteers, organizations, and citizens in a shared act of care for Palawan’s remaining green spaces.
For ELAC, the activity was more than just a ceremonial tree-planting. It was a reminder that forest protection begins with presence: showing up, touching the soil, listening to the land, and remembering that every seedling carries a promise that must be nurtured beyond a single day.
Pista Y ang Kageban has long been part of Puerto Princesa’s environmental identity. The city describes it as an annual activity dedicated to regenerating forest areas, with more than 2 million trees planted from 1991 to 2009 and over 200 hectares of stripped forest mountains in Barangays Irawan andSta. Lourdes rehabilitated through the years. In 2023, the Philippine News Agency also reported that the activity continued as a citywide tree-planting effort, including urban greening initiatives aimed at addressing rising heat in the city.
ELAC staff joined fellow participants in planting native seedlings in a designated planting area, carrying the message printed on their shirts: “Likas na lakas ng katutubong kabataan para sa kultura at kalikasan.” It was a fitting call for the day. Young people, community members, civil society groups, and environmental advocates came together not only to plant trees, but to affirm that Palawan’s forests are part of a living inheritance.
The activity also comes at a time when discussions on forest loss remain urgent. Across Palawan, forests face pressure from land conversion, road-building, extractive projects, weak enforcement, and other development activities that open fragile areas to further degradation. In this context, tree planting must be paired with stronger forest governance, watershed protection, respect for Indigenous Peoples’ rights, and accountability for activities that destroy forests faster than communities can restore them.
“Planting is an act of hope”. “But hope must be defended. A seedling will not survive if the forest around it continues to be cleared, if watersheds are weakened, or if communities are excluded from decisions affecting their land.”
Through its participation, ELAC reaffirmed its commitment to working with communities, youth, Indigenous Peoples, local governments, schools, and civil society partners to defend Palawan’s forests—not only through restoration activities but also through legal empowerment, environmental advocacy, and citizen monitoring.
As the volunteers left the planting site, the young trees stood small against the landscape. But each one marked a quiet commitment: that the work of protecting Palawan is not finished when the seedling is planted. It continues in the tending, the watching, the speaking out, and the collective insistence that forests are not empty spaces waiting to be used, but living systems that sustain water, culture, biodiversity, and life.
Together, let’s keep Palawan’s forests standing.
