By Celeste Anna R. Formoso
PUERTO PRINCESA CITY, (PNA) -– Fresh from Corsica, France, where she was invited to attend the UNESCO Marine World Heritage Convention in October, new Puerto Princesa Underground River (PPUR) park manager Elizabeth Maclang is reportedly considering efforts to expand its land area coverage.
PPUR spokesperson Elmer Badilla said Monday that Maclang is contemplating on proposing an expansion of the territorial coverage of the approximately 5,753-hectare PPUR park located in Barangay Cabayugan after getting enlightenment from the convention held on October 13-15.
“Basically, she was invited to attend the UNESCO Marine World Heritage Convention. All the park managers of all marine world heritage sites in the globe were reportedly introduced. They had sharing of good experiences, bad experiences where they can learn from, workshops on communications, etcetera. They formulated also an outlook for all the marine world heritage sites. She was inspired on why in other countries, marine parks or protected marine parks are expanding, and yet, in Palawan, they’re getting smaller and smaller,” Badilla said.
Badilla said before the new head of the PPUR makes any effort, an assessment of the park and its covered territories will be done first through the help of experts, one of which is the Palawan Council for Sustainable Development Staff (PCSDS) that has the capability and the technical persons.
“There will be an assessment of the park first before any proposal to expand it is done by the management,” Badilla said.
According to the UNESCO, the PPUR park features a spectacular limestone karst landscape with an underground river.
One of the river’s distinguishing features is that it emerges directly into the sea, and its lower portion is subject to tidal influences. The area also represents a significant habitat for biodiversity conservation. The site contains a full “mountain-to-sea” ecosystem and has some of the most important forests in Asia.
It is located in the south-western part of the Philippine Archipelago on the mid-western coast of Palawan, approximately 76 km northwest of Puerto Princesa and 360 km. southwest of Manila.