Veco exceeds target of 1M trees

After hitting the target to plant 1 million trees, the Visayan Electric Company (Veco) continued to plant more trees in the Cebu Central Protected Landscape (CCPL).

Last Sept. 22, 70 Veco employees (kaibigans), led by senior vice president and chief operating officer Sebastian Lacson, trooped to sitio Lamakan in barangay Pamutan, Cebu City to plant a total of 12,500 seedlings of Ficus religiosa (balete) and molave.

The ficus seedlings were donated by John Kiener, a businessman.

The employees planted 170 seedlings each to rehabilitate the Mananga Watershed, which is part of CCPL and Veco’s adopted site for its Reforestation Park Project.

The Veco scholars also took part in the company’s 4th annual tree planting activity.

Aiming for a 90 percent survival rate of the planted trees, Veco, together with the Philippine Business for Social Progress (PBSP), tasked the Sto. Niño Farmers’ Association to maintain the 540-hectare planting site in the Mananga watershed.

The company has already planted a total of 1,024,240 forest and fruit-bearing trees. These include 911,740 seedlings of various species, such as narra, hambabalod, tagilomboy, lumbang, mangkono, tipolo, dao, nato, lawaan, kamagong/mabolo, molave, banuyo, tindalo and lanutan in Veco’s reforestation sites in barangay Pung-ol, Sibugay, Sudlon II, Bonbon and Tabunan in Cebu City; 100,000 mangrove propagules at the Naval Forces Central in barangay Looc, Lapu-Lapu City; and 12,500 seedlings in barangay Pamutan.

With the reforestation, 51 bird species, 11 of which can only be found in the Philippines, are now thriving in the watershed.