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Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Osmeña: Urgency of land use planning and control
By Antonio V. Osmeña
Estatements
Unless the population of Cebu is stabilized or its growth rate reduced, the government will have a difficult time steering the province’s urban development into the right direction through land use planning and control.
At the beginning of the last century, less than three per cent of Cebu’s population lived in urban areas. An area is considered urban if it has a population of more than 10,000 people. But today, 50 per cent of the population are urban dwellers, half of them unemployed or underemployed.
Unprecedented urban growth, especially north of Metro Cebu, should prod the government to decide on the best use of each parcel of land and to map out suitable location for houses, industries, businesses, open space, roads, water lines, sewer, hospitals, schools, waste treatment plants and so on. The Province of Cebu and its component cities need new ecological approaches to land use planning. This means that (1) top quality farmland should be preserved; (2) building and farming should not occur on hillsides that are prone to erosion, or on valuable wetlands and flood plains; (3) building near surface waters (rivers, lakes) should be regulated to keep water levels stable and to reduce pollution; (4) land use near aquifers (groundwater storage) should be strictly regulated; (5) forests should be preserved and expanded to ensure sustainable water, reduce the likelihood of floods, absorb noise and air pollution; and (6) social needs and public participation should be integrated in planning.
It is imperative for Cebu’s congressional representatives to fund ecological land use planning, which include making an environmental and social inventory where a comprehensive geological, ecological and social survey of the land is made.
In ecological planning, experts, public officials and the general public determine the goals or objectives of the plan. This is one of the most important and difficult steps in planning, in which ethical land use conflicts are resolved.
The process also involves the production of individual and composite maps that separately show geological, ecological and social-economic variables. Each map shows how the variables interact.
In the comprehensive land use plan the three (variable) maps are combined to form a master composite that shows which area is suitable for a specific land use. Using this technique, it becomes clear how certain areas should or should not be used.
The comprehensive land use plan is evaluated by experts, public officials and the general public. After which, a final comprehensive plan is drawn and approved.
Once done, the plan is implemented. An appropriate government body will monitor the plan’s implementation.
A century and a half ago, the Province of Cebu had a population of less than a million dwellers and Ciudad de Cebu had about 10,000 inhabitants. But in a few decades, Cebu island’s population will reach 10 million.
Now is the time to conduct ecological planning in order to help planners and citizens strike a balance among the major types of ecosystems. Cebu’s fragile ecosystems will collapse for the lack of foresight among the inhabitants.
(September 28, 2005 issue)
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