0050-C1
Nathaniel C. Bantayan[1]
The Philippine population is increasing at an annual rate of 2.36%. Latest estimates of 2000 put the number at 76.3 million, and by 2029 the population is expected to more than double to 150 million. Current estimates reveal that about 20 million Filipinos live and depend on the uplands for their livelihood. Thus, government programs that recognize these uplanders as partners in development have been put in place (i.e. community-based forest management). However, the results have been wanting principally due to organizational and logistical problems. The problem is exacerbated by a lack of reliable land cover statistics on areas requiring rehabilitation, including areas where proliferation of people has occurred. On the ground, this is quite evident, but no data is available that would confidently inform policymakers about the extent of such intrusion. To address the problem of sustainable land management, the government has embraced the watershed management approach. This calls for recognition of the watershed continuum that includes the uplands, the lowlands and the coastal environment and the highlighting of the important relationships that need to be recognized between the social and environmental components. For instance, downstream effects of uncontrolled logging or inappropriate upland farming consequently inundate the lowland areas and eventually lead to siltation of the streambeds and decreased agricultural productivity.
This paper seeks to present practical applications of geomatics that will enhance the capability of upland communities to manage their resources and ultimately contribute to sustainable forest management. An attempt is made to convert the mental maps of upland communities into a spatial model that is characteristic of geographic information system (GIS) technology. This assumes that uplanders are able to transform valuable experiences on resource management into a tangible multipurpose tool that will, inter alia:
increase awareness of environmental and resource management,
enhance community participation in government programs,
allow for collaborative planning and research,
increase local community communication and conflict resolution.
Land, by its immovable and everlasting nature, has forced societies to shape their existence in the pursuit of a sustainable and equitable future. In divergent social structures, land is perceived differently. Thus, the functional relationships which exist between these social systems and the land should be considered accordingly. Such a distinction is crucial to give justice to the communal characteristics of tribal societies typical of those in tropical developing countries as opposed to the parcel-based private land ownership in the industrialized West. This Western concept of land enables division and mapping based on abstract references. Such view is critical to its system of land tenure and to its market-oriented economy.
In the tribal communities of tropical developing countries, the extent, location and boundaries of land is more a matter of subjective description rather than any form of legal documentation. Consequently, by customary law, ownership of the land is vested in the community leader/council while the members have mere possession albeit usufruct rights. These traditional societies typify an integrated relationship with land - an ecological attitude that is comprehensive, long-range and systemic vis-a-vis the developed, industrialized economistic view that "land is a financial resource - a commodity bought, owned, sold and used for some financial return (Caldwell and Shrader-Frechette, 1993)."
The objective of sustainable land management is to recognize the limits of human consumption and harmonize the complementary goals of society and the economy while maintaining environmental quality (soil, water, air). Sustainable land management must be geared towards the optimal performance of the total landscape and a harmonious interaction among its landscape elements: environmental, social, political, technological, and economic landscapes. Social justice and economic well-being is dependent on sound environmental programs and policies formulated under a stable political dispensation.
The forestry paradigm determines the way we see, think about, and manage our forests and related environmental resources (Rebugio 2000). For upland communities in particular, the assumptions used in their relationship with the forest and natural resources is governed by their experiences in managing these resources. Thus, through time, they have generated mental maps by which they use to locate certain crops at different times of the year including other activities that relate to sustainable land management. In the absence of intervening events or occurrences (e.g. government extension activities regarding new technologies), they continue to practice old-age traditions and practices. Thus, while the world around them learn and practice new ways of doing things (e.g. resource technologies), they have become isolated and their practice have become obsolete. This statement is made only in the context of the need to recognize and appreciate new paradigms as they become available assuming that such paradigms are relevant under prevailing circumstances.
In the 1970s, the demand for more complex analysis of natural resources phenomena arose. Unfortunately, the current computer-based mapping technology of the time, while able to handle large amounts of data was unable to associate non-spatial data with points, lines and polygons on the maps, albeit digital. Such association of spatial and non-spatial attributes is important especially in natural resources management. For example, land suitability analysis necessitates a matching of the physical capacity of the land to accommodate alternative landuses. Mapping of the physical characteristics of the land in terms of soil properties, vegetation cover and current landuse, infrastructure, etc. is fairly straightforward. But in a land suitability exercise, an opportunity for iterative matching of the physical characteristics of the land with the landuse alternative must be in place for such analysis to succeed. There is therefore a necessity to break up the map into themes (soil map, vegetation cover map, etc.) to allow for iteration.
The geomatics paradigm presents the organization with a new way of handling spatial data and information. It uses space as the operational ground for addressing the organization's day-to-day activities. Different persons perceive the world differently. According to Huxhold and Levinsohn (1995), implementing the GIS paradigm must start with a translation of the person's perception of reality into a model in the computer. This representation exposes the person's own knowledge system and how reality is modeled or symbolized digitally. Such perception is organized and structured into a conceptual or logical data model that represents the user's perception structure and the GIS paradigm. Thus, standards are achieved and an understanding of what is common and what is unique is clearly delineated.
Community-based GIS can be seen in terms of utilizing GIS technology in enhancing the capability of upland communities to better manage the natural resources around them. The adoption of the technology should be limited in its use as a tool for resource management. Establishing a GIS system in each community is impractical and unnecessary. GIS implementation should be limited to assisting the community transform their mental maps into tangible form that will allow georeferencing and spatial analysis.
Two major goals may be identified for upland communities where geomatics may be most helpful: poverty alleviation and resource planning. Essentially, these goals are intricately connected to each other.
The concept of poverty stems from the lack of access to resources and opportunities that would enable a human being to a level of well-being. Thus, loosely defined, poverty is the ability (or inability) to attain a minimal standard of. This minimum level is usually called the 'poverty line.' There are well developed measures of poverty undertaken mainly by institutions like the United Nations, World Bank, Asian Development Bank, among others.
Integrating GIS in mapping poverty, therefore, is a necessary task. A poverty map is a geographic profile indicating concentrations of well-being. Such maps are useful, for instance, in targeting interventions and policies geared towards alleviating poverty. GIS-assisted poverty mapping, therefore, may be implemented based on the following:
Accessibility to resources and services
Biogeographical mapping
Vulnerability mapping
Georeferencing and geocoding of economic and non-economic well-being
Resource planning relates to assisting the communities plan out the most appropriate farming system (i.e. agroforestry) design with the aid of geomatics. Implementation may be done by visualizing the location and allocation problem as a set of map layers or themes representing earth features. Generating thematic layers allows for selective combination that answers specific questions of the natural resource manager.
Where is the best place to plant citrus based on:
soil characteristics?
proximity to water sources?
distance to transportation networks?
topography, among others?
This is a typical question in resource location/allocation that can readily be answered using geomatics. Also, this is where the necessary transformation of mental maps into digital spatial models must be undertaken. This can be done in the form of participatory 3D modeling and through a grid-based participatory rural appraisal. The details of these methodologies are outlined in the following section.
The use of geomatics in natural resource management is very limited. Although some GIS encoding is pursued through georeferencing of important GPS points, its use is primarily for cartographic presentation. GIS processing is lacking in analytical form mainly due to the following reasons:
Lack of understanding on the basic concepts and principles of GIS;
Lack of training of relevant personnel;
The organization finds it prohibitive in establishing a GIS system
A methodology for resource mapping and zoning using communities in the validation, update and zoning of large areas was developed where communities transform their mental maps into tangible relief models (Rambaldi and Callosa-Tarr, 2000). The process involves the construction of a scaled relief model by the communities themselves of areas where they live and practice farming and other livelihood activities. The process involves preparatory work, model assembly, detailing, model handover, information extraction, digitizing and manipulation and field verification. These steps involve determining the area to be modeled through existing topographic or administrative maps. Participants are selected and gathered together for a training on participatory resource mapping. The participants may come from community representatives, indigenous peoples' groups, local and non-government organizations. Other necessary information on demographics, landuse, vegetation, ancestral domain, and other relevant data are collected. This is where GIS-generated inputs are most crucial (e.g. maps of convenient scale containing relevant natural and cultural features).
In model assembly, carton sheets are cut according to individual elevations or contours; the individual cut up sheets are then assembled into a relief model of the area followed by attaching details to the relief model according to landuse, vegetation cover, and other relevant features (e.g. roads, trails, drainage, etc). An important next step involves handing over to the community where subsequent extraction of all information from the relief model is undertaken. These information will be processed using GIS. Lastly, the GIS overlays are groundtruthed in the field for further enhancement.
A major advantage of participatory 3D modeling is in terms of developing community awareness and self-realization. Through the model, a community member is able to visualize oneself as a member of a larger geographic and ecological entirety. In addition, spatial relationships are easily understood and appreciated.
In an on-going suitability assessment of Ligawasan Marsh in Mindanao, Philippines, a participatory rural appraisal was conducted in 21 towns covering three provinces (i.e. Maguindanao, Sultan Kudarat and Cotabato. The existing appraisal instrument, however, did not provide for an accurate location of features that are vital to protected area assessment. While the instrument provided the barangay (a local administrative entity) in which these can be found, natural and cultural features and landmarks cannot be located with acceptable accuracy on the map, if at all.
This deficiency provided the opportunity to improve on the instrument by enhancing the locational attributes of the survey instrument. In addition, a municipal map with relevant barangay boundaries, roads and drainage are attached to each questionnaire. For clarity and subsequent GIS encoding and processing, the attached maps are divided into grids of convenient size (i.e. 100 m to 1 km). The grids are properly coded where rows are labeled 1 thru N (i.e. N is the last row) and columns are coded A thru n (i.e. n is the last column).
The actual conduct of the appraisal is improved by having a large GIS-produced gridded map pasted on the wall where the community members are given the opportunity to point the location of a feature (e.g. spring, bird's nest, etc). At instances where the same feature is found within the same barangay, the coding is made unique because of the grid location. Within the same grid, convenient codes can be established to differentiate one feature from the other (e.g. nest1C4 - meaning nest 1 which can be found on grid C4; springG8 - meaning a spring found on grid C8).
As opposed to the participatory 3D modeling process, this grid-based approach takes less time to finish the appraisal and the coded maps can be easily transported for further GIS processing and analysis.
The Philippine Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and its attached agencies manage an extensive collection of spatial and statistical data. In a recent study into forest boundary delineation, a GIS-based database design containing the general characteristics of the various landuses in the uplands was prepared (Revilla, JA, 2002). The design is based on the graphical user interface and database querying structure of ESRI Arcview[2] GIS.
The landuses and their characteristics were expressed as SITE DESCRIPTORS with the specifications and coding structure following the definitions of the Technical Working Group on the Inter-Agency Task Force on Geographic Information (TWG-IATFGI) and the comprehensive database system for development planning, field operations and monitoring at the watershed/'sustainable development unit' level by the DENR/FDC/UPLB-FI SUSDEV Database Project. The design and implementation of the geodatabase followed three levels of data abstraction and representation (after Radwan, MM, et al. 1991):
Conceptual model level - a general information model based on user-views and applications. This is done to avoid data redundancy;
Internal data structure level (GIS database design) - the physical computer file level that is handled by the DBMS; and
Data collection model level - methods for data collection and feature abstraction;
The minimum record unit for georeferencing was expressed through 1 km by 1 km GRID cells and further divided into 25-ha QUADRANTS. Each record unit was expressed in terms of the following SITE DESCRIPTORS: location, physical, hydrometeorological, socio-economic, and environmental data. Within the GIS framework, the record unit formed the graphical/map component and linked interactively to its attributes via the database management system of the GIS. In addition, the GIS framework formed the backbone for implementing spatial queries and other processing and analytical requirements of forest resource assessment, monitoring and evaluation.
Each grid-cell is unique and is defined by the following:
GRID_CELL_ID = [Island_Group + Grid_Cell_Number]
where the Island_Group corresponds to a unique 2-letter identifier for the corresponding islands/island groups of the Philippines. Possible identifiers may be based on the major islands of the country, to wit:
LU and LG for Luzon and island groups belonging to Luzon, respectively;
VI and VG for Visayas and island groups belonging to the Visayas, respectively; and
MI and MG for Mindanao and island groups belonging to Mindanao, respectively.
The Grid_Cell_Number is a 3-digit number corresponding to the grid-cells for the island/island group numbered from 001 up to a possible and maximum 999.
Further, each Grid_Cell Quadrant is defined by the following:
Grid_Cell Quadrant = [Island_Group + Grid_Cell_Number + Grid_Cell Quadrant]
where a quadrant is a 1-digit number corresponding to the quadrant of the grid_cell of interest (GCI).
The developments in computer-based systems on society as a whole is still increasing and expanding. The emergence and seeming domination of the Internet has brought about a new economy bringing peoples and businesses closer than ever before. Computers are now an integral part of any organization and without which organizations have become obsolete or gobbled up by technology-based organizations.
Mapping technology has a practical place in natural resource management. Technologies developed elsewhere should be tested in other situations to take opportunity of such technology's capabilities. Once these are tested, the necessary adjusted, if any, can be implemented to ensure applicability to local situations and circumstances.
Geomatics has allowed many organizations to better manage their activities as well as identify solutions to pressing problems in a more responsive way. Some innovative NGOs working primarily with upland communities have joined the bandwagon in establishing their own GIS units. Some of these NGOs have tried to address the complexities of boundary delineation of tribal communities in the Philippine uplands. However, tribal boundaries do not coincide with national political boundaries. Such NGOs therefore play a vital role in bridging the misunderstandings between players (tribal communities and government instrumentalities.
While this technology has more or less empowered natural resource organizations, the underlying principles necessary for its integration is still ad hoc. The presence of a GIS unit in the bureaucracy is still a mystery if not altogether lacking. What the functional relationships are among and between these GIS units and offices still have to be elaborated and clarified.
Empowering communities to better manage their resources in collaboration with government and other stakeholders must be institutionalized. This is possible only if the following assumptions are realized and recognized:
Upland communities are able to convert their mental maps into tangible form
Upland communities are progressive and not laggards
The GRID-based approach presented here is one concrete step in putting into tangible management form the forest resource - where they occur and in what amount and extent. Ultimately, all stakeholders including the communities will benefit from a high-tech tool like GIS that is implemented in a practical approach.
Bantayan, NC. 1996. Participatory decision support systems: the case of the Makiling Forest Reserve. PhD Thesis. The University of Melbourne.
Caldwell, L.K. and K. Shrader-Frechette. 1993. Policy for land: law and ethics. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc. pp. 333.
Longley, Paul, MF Goodchild, DJ Maguire, DW Rhind. 2001. Geographic information systems and science. Wiley&Sons. Pp 472. ISBN 0471495212.
Radwan, MM, et al. Guidelines for a digital database for topographic and terrain relief information at Bakosurtanal, Indonesia. In: ITC Journal Bulletin De L'ITC 1991-3. pages 144-152
Rambaldi, G, Callosa J. 2000. Manual on Participatory 3-Dimensional Modeling for Natural Resources Management. Essentials of Protected Area Management in the Philippines, Vol. 7 NIPAP-PAWB-DENR, Philippines.
Rebugio, Lucrecio L. 2000. Shifting Paradigms in Natural Resources Management. 3rd Natural Resources Managers' Course. TREES CFNR UPLB.
Revilla, JA, Bantayan, NC, Canonizado JA, Peralta, EO, and Franco, DR. 2002. Draft Report on Forest Boundary Delineation Policy Study. LAMP-DENR Philippines.
Revilla, JA. 1999. SUSDEV Manual. DENR Philippines.
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