Having visited many developing countries and seen many places where environmental degradation or destructive development has damaged the livelihoods of people, I was nevertheless deeply shocked by the negative impact of mining in the Philippines. In July 2006 I led a team of human rights and environmental experts on a fact finding visit to the Philippines in order to examine the impact of mining on the environment and people’s livelihoods. We met with communities affected by mining and proposals for new mines. We heard how indigenous people had been shifted off their lands to make way for mining and how their consultation rights had been undermined and ignored. We saw polluted rivers, destroyed mangrove forests, damaged coral and ruined agriculture. We concluded that the Philippines is in danger of losing much of its rich biodiversity and damaging the lives of unique indigenous cultures. I believe that current plans for mining in the Philippines should be scrapped and a new strategy put in place which takes proper account of the large number of jobs that already exist in small scale mining and the need to establish criteria for that development of the mining industry which protects the precious and unique biodiversity of the Philippines and the rights of indigenous communities.

Fact-Finding Mission to the Philippines Report (2006)