DRONES VS. ILLEGAL LOGGING
DRONES VS. ILLEGAL LOGGING Department of Environment and National Resources regional director Joselin Marcus Fragada announces that the region will be the first to use drones or remote-controlled surveillance planes…
OPEFUL. Norma ‘Bat Mama’ Monfort dreams to build a huge all-concrete structure as habitat for the bats in Samal island, Davao del Norte. (davaotoday.com photo by Medel V. Hernani)
Samal’s bat cave habitat
Building the huge all-concrete structure -- chiroptorium -- will not come cheap.
PRECIOUS ROCK. Rocks that contain gold ores such as this are abundant in the mountains of Davao region. (davaotoday.com photo by Medel V. Hernani)
Davao mountains yield gold, but gov’t paid cheap
With the number of mining firms under exploration concessions, gold, nickel and copper in the rocky mountains of Davao region continue to be up for grabs. But government earnings from the excise taxes paid by mining firms are small.
BIAS TO SMALL-SCALE MINING. Bayan Muna representative Teddy Casino, in a recent Davao City press briefing, says his authored People's Mining Bill (HB 4315) in Congress is biased to small-scale mining and not to large-scale mining. (davaotoday.com photo by Ace R. Morandante)
Exploring a policy framework for mining
By MARILOU AGUIRRE-TUBURAN
Dionesy, a former abantero who lost his two nephews in the landslide, takes a rest and watch as other volunteers dig to find more bodies still burried in the mud. (photo by John Rizle Saligumba/davaotoday.com)
Small-scale miners in Pantukan ask, why blame us?
By JOHN RIZLE SALIGUMBA
Small-scale miners grapple with the impact of landslides and the government’s demolition order.