Tax breaks offered to firms helping wildlife conservation

MANILA, Philippines—Hoping to entice the private sector to fund wildlife conservation, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources  has stepped up its campaign to forge public-private partnerships by offering tax breaks to firms who would contribute to the effort.

Theresa Mundita Lim, director of DENR’s Protected Areas and Wildlife Bureau, said the department has laid down a mechanism to give tax incentives to companies who would donate to wildlife conservation efforts.

PAWB’s move is part of its implementation of the “Adopt-a-Wildlife Species Program,” enacted through an administrative order in June last year but hardly implemented for lack of promotion, Lim said.

The order covers conservation programs for critically endangered species, including the Philippine cockatoo, the Philippine eagle, the Philippine crocodile, the tamaraw, pawikan, dugong, the Philippine spotted dear and the Visayan warty pig, among others.

“So if you support any conservation program, you are eligible for tax incentives. Now, there’s a mechanism to do that, when before, there was no information on how to do it, where firms could apply, who to report to and how to account for their contributions,” Lim told the Inquirer.

“In the past few years, there has been some interest shown by some corporations. The mechanism was not so clear, how can they engage. So right now we are providing a system which would allow them [to participate] and allow us to monitor where the support really goes,” Lim said.

Per DENR’s 2010 order, a contributing firm is eligible to tax breaks equivalent to their total donation to PAWB conservation projects.

“So for example, your tax is supposed to be P1 million but you’ve made a contribution of P500,000 for the Philippine Eagle Foundation, then you will only have to pay P500,000 because the other half is already considered your contribution,”  said Lim.

Companies that would like to take part in the program should enter into an agreement with DENR, which would then issue a certificate of actual financial contribution so they could be eligible for tax incentives upon filing at the Bureau of Internal Revenue.

PAWB on Thursday held a conservation forum at the business district in Ortigas Center to encourage more firms to take part in wildlife preservation programs.