The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) has chosen a new mining undersecretary after the major reshuffle among officials of the agency, which was finalized before 2019 ended.
Environment Undersecretary Analiza Rebuelta-Teh confirmed that the job has been transferred to Environment Undersecretary Juan Miguel Cuna, according to a report.
Cuna is now responsible for policy, planning, and international affairs as well as the supervising undersecretary for Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) and Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB).
Teh will keep her position as the DENR’s undersecretary for climate change. This was done after a major reshuffle among the department’s executives. In addition, Teh supposedly retained her assignment as the undersecretary for climate change and mining concerns as well as the supervising officer for MGB and EMB.
Cuna, on the other hand, would be field undersecretary in Luzon operations and will be in charge of monitoring the agency’s priority programs.
Teh and Cuna’s designated responsibilities were orders issued by Cimatu.
Meanwhile, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) filed graft charges against Cuna and other DENR staff for allegedly committing a series of acts leading to the illegal importation of solid wastes from Canada.
MGB is now planning to intensify its monitoring on existing permits to ensure the Philippine government is getting the appropriate, if not higher, revenue shares from the mining industry.
The agency will also strengthen its monitoring of mining permits/ contracts to check if the mining firms are compliant of the prevailing laws and regulations.
This is in line of MGB Director Wilfredo Moncano’s policy direction for the sector this year, which includes “strong monitoring and enforcement, people-oriented by providing jobs and benefits to communities, completion of environmental rehabilitation of abandoned mines and mined-out areas, increase in contribution to national income, transformation into a world-class and competitive mining industry and wider implementation of risk resiliency program to support the climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction programs of the government.”
Effective monitoring is the only way to make sure that the government will get higher revenue shares from the sector since the government’s proposal for higher mining tax is still in Congress.
