Policy Directions of the Mines and Geosciences Bureau

Jeremias L. Dolino

Assistant Secretary
Department of Environment and Natural Resources
Concurrent Director – MGB

Believing on the potential of the minerals sector to attract new investments, generate revenues for the government and provide additional jobs and livelihood opportunities, the Government made a policy shift from mere tolerance to active promotion of the minerals industry. This revitalization of the minerals industry, however, should be anchored on the triple bottomline principles of sustainable development that takes into consideration environmental protection and social equity in line with economic development. This policy thrust was pursued through Executive Order (EO) No. 270, as amended, or the National Policy Agenda on Revitalizing Mining in the Philippines, under the blanket of the Philippine Mining Act of 1995. The Minerals Action Plan provided the strategies to implement the thrusts of EO No. 270.

To pursue this objective, the government has initiated various reforms to promote investment and facilitate its inflow to the country. Streamlining and simplifying the procedures to expedite the approval of mining rights were undertaken by identifying bottlenecks and injecting cures to ensure that doing business in the Philippines will be competitive with the rest of the world. Cleansing of mining tenements was also carried out to weed out speculative and idle mining tenements, to give way for more qualified entities. The Government has also engaged the Philippine Stock Exchange to relax the requirements for the listing of mining projects.

In the environmental and social front, various initiatives were carried out to increase the social acceptability of mining. Stakeholders are now aware that responsible mining is achievable by adhering to norms of sound environmental stewardship and corporate social responsibility. Corporate social responsibility has become a major concern. Amendments of existing laws that will facilitate payment of local government share from mining are underway. Environmental protection is further being strengthened through trust funds, insurance coverage and third party audits.

In spite of all these, the Government realizes that a lot still remains to be done to achieve our goals for the minerals industry. Policies will have to be geared toward a Philippine minerals industry with sustained exploration activities dominated by new generation, high profit potential mines able to absorb the social and environmental costs of modern mining and contributing to the sustained economic well-being of the nation and in countryside community development; and a value-added minerals industry that paves the way to industrialization by generating wealth, employment and other benefits in both rural and urban regions and exporting finished products rather than raw materials.