The Makakalikasan – Nature Party Philippines reaffirms our call to halt the ongoing commodification of Philippine forests under the guise of climate action through carbon offset markets. As exposed in recent reports, vast areas of our remaining forests and ancestral lands—especially in Palawan, the Cordillera, and the Sierra Madre—are being offered to foreign companies for long-term carbon projects like REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation), often without proper consultation with Indigenous Peoples and local communities.
We recognize that the Philippines, being one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable countries, urgently needs to pursue effective adaptation and mitigation strategies. However, carbon credit schemes must not come at the cost of community rights, biodiversity, and sovereignty.
What’s at stake?
As of 2023, only 23.9% of the Philippines’ land remains forested, and we continue to lose over 47,000 hectares per year. Yet instead of restoring forests through community-led conservation, current carbon markets allow polluters to buy forest land to “offset” emissions, without actually reducing global carbon outputs. This undermines real climate action and violates the principles of climate justice.
“This is not climate action — this is a corporate cash grab cloaked in green branding,” says Roy Jerusalem Cabonegro, President of the Makakalikasan Nature Party Philippines. “The move is a false climate solution that diverts attention from real emission reductions and threatens Indigenous rights and biodiversity. Real solutions lie in community-based forest governance, agroecology, and strong state regulation—not in the sale of our forests for foreign profit.”
A Way Forward: A Just and Effective REDD+?
We do not reject REDD+ in principle—but we reject how it is currently being practiced. As argued in Effective Adaptation and Making REDD Work in a Vulnerable Country, REDD+ must be redesigned to prioritize adaptation, not just mitigation, and must uphold Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC). It must recognize the ecological knowledge of Indigenous communities and be embedded in localized, participatory climate governance.
We urge the government, climate financiers, and all stakeholders to adopt the following urgent actions:
- Impose a moratorium on all carbon offset and REDD+ projects that lack community consultation and FPIC.
- Legally recognize and fund “Community Climate Resilience Zones” across key ecosystems.
- Restore at least 1.5 million hectares of degraded forests through biodiversity-based reforestation by 2030.
- Redirect public climate funds toward community-led adaptation projects, not volatile carbon markets.
- Develop a Philippine REDD+ framework that integrates adaptation, ecosystem restoration, and social equity.
We affirm our Climate and Public Health Emergency Actions and Biodiversity and Habitat Conservation Agenda, which call for centering people, not profits, in ecological governance.
This is not simply about carbon. This is about climate justice, land justice, and ecological survival.