Greetings to the staff of KALIKASAN Updates and to all the members of the DENR Family in Isabela!
To the DENR, the province of Isabela represents a supreme challenge. This is where the largest stand of our country’s remaining old-growth forest pleads for protection and conservation. This forest is home to an incredible array of biodiversity, much of it endemic. And Isabela is co-host with the province of Aurora to the country’s largest protected area, the Northern Sierra Madre Natural Park, consisting of almost 360,000 hectares, four-fifths of which is terrestrial and the rest marine. It has been tagged as a “tentative” World Heritage Site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. So crucial is this area to our environment, that others – including Conservation International, the Smithsonian Institution, and other foreign partners – have also placed it under caring watch.
More than elsewhere, the DENR in Isabela is being measured according to the high expectations of global environmental exponents. The DENR-Isabela, therefore, deserves the fullest support that we in the Central Office can muster.
We are highly pleased to note, however, that the DENR-Isabela has been proactive. Its KALIKASAN Updates for the past 13 years are eloquent proof of what has become a tradition of taking the initiative, and of having worthwhile achievements to report to and share with local stakeholders as well as international partners. To be able to sustain such performance under constant pressure is nothing short of admirable.
I therefore encourage the people of DENR-Isabela to keep up the very good work. Your commendable example is certainly an inspiration to the rest of the DENR Family.
Mabuhay!
JOSE L. ATIENZA JR.
Secretary
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