DOES THE PHILIPPINES NEED AN ENVIRONMENTAL POLICE FORCE?

DOES THE PHILIPPINES NEED AN ENVIRONMENTAL POLICE FORCE? Let me ask a blunt question: how can we expect environmental laws to be respected when the agency tasked to protect the environment does not even have real police muscle? The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) is, by law, our primary guardian of forests, wildlife, rivers, and seas. But let us be honest—DENR today enforces the law mostly with clipboards, confiscation receipts, and endless coordination letters. When things turn dangerous, it must call in the Philippine National Police (PNP) or even the Armed Forces. By then, timber, wildlife, minerals, and even evidence may already be gone. Compare that with other countries. Brazil’s IBAMA has armed enforcement agents. Indonesia has forest police units under its environment ministry. Kenya’s Wildlife Service even has paramilitary rangers. These countries face dangerous, well-funded syndicates, just like we do. And they answered the problem with dedicated environmental enforcers. Here in the Philippines, I am not even proposing a radical new agency. My suggestion is simpler and, I believe, more realistic: create an Environmental Patrol Group (EPG) under the PNP. We already have the Highway Patrol Group. Why not an EPG? I admit this sounds like a desperate idea. But I am desperate—desperate because illegal logging still thrives, wildlife trafficking continues, destructive fishing refuses to die, mining violations recur, and waste management laws are openly ignored in many localities. The DENR has enforcement powers on paper, yes, but not full police powers in practice. It relies on deputized officers and coordination. That fragmentation weakens everything. Some violators are not just “small offenders.” Some have private armies, political protectors, and deep pockets. How do you arrest that with nothing but warning letters? Sometimes, sadly, force must answer force—within the bounds of law, of course. But let me be clear: an Environmental Patrol Group should not be a trigger-happy unit roaming barangays with rifles. In everyday community work, it could focus on education—waste segregation, river protection, anti-littering, compliance with Materials Recovery Facilities (MRFs), sewage treatment plants (STPs), and sanitary landfills (SLFs). Law enforcement does not always mean handcuffs. Sometimes it means presence, persuasion, and consistency. This also brings us to a bigger question about governance. Interior ministries around the world focus on internal security, law enforcement, disaster response, and local government supervision. The Philippines follows this model through the DILG. The United States is a strange exception—its Department of the Interior is more about land, parks, and indigenous affairs than policing. We copied neither fully. We gave DENR the environment but not the force. We gave DILG the force but not the environment. The result? Gaps. Overlaps. And plenty of violators exploiting both. Of course, critics will say: creating or expanding a police unit costs money. True. There is also the fear of militarizing environmental protection. Also true. But is our current system working? If it were, our forests would not be shrinking so fast, our rivers would not be open sewers, and our seas would not be among the most overfished in the world. So here are my questions: Why must DENR beg for police support every time it enforces the law? Why not professionalize environmental enforcement within the PNP itself? Why not give environmental crimes the same seriousness we give traffic violations? We all say the environment is life. If that is true, then protecting it should never be treated as a weak, optional, secondary function of government. Whether through a full environmental police force or an Environmental Patrol Group under the PNP, one thing is clear to me: the environment needs enforcement with teeth, not just with talking points. BY RAMON IKE V. SENERES www.facebook.com/ike.seneres iseneres@yahoo.com senseneres.blogspot.com 09088877282/10-24-2026