An Environmental Crisis

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Several years ago, a freak flood inundated Ormoc City in Leyte. There was little time to flee many of the coastal city's residents were still asleep. When the flood subsided more than 4000 people lay dead. The flooding was eventually traveled to the city's denuded watersheds, but no illegal logger was ever made to account for these deaths. And the tragedy did not stop illegal loggers and their codlers from further reducing the country's depleted forest cover.
For years environmental groups have been raising an alarm on the country's rapidly dwindling forest cover. Illegal logging, slash-and-burn farming and development have destroyed much of the country's forest. The signs of destruction are hard to miss: scorched earth, balding hills, heavily silted bodies of water that overflow in the briefest downpour. The destruction of natural habitats has also led to the extinction of certain species with a number of others on the endangered list.
With the latest disaster, there will be some noise
about intensifying the campaign against illegal loggers. But a death toll of 18 may be too low to discourage these who make a living out of destroying vital watersheds. Illegal loggers in lucrative, few people get caught, and no one is prosecuted for the deadly floods that result from heavily logged hillsides. This is an environmental crisis that calls of immediate government attention.