Mt. Arayat off-limits after Holy Week

MAJESTIC Mt. Arayat beckons to trekkers. —TONETTE OREJAS

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga, Philippines — The Mt. Arayat National Park will be off-limits to local and foreign trekkers and bikers starting April 13 to give way to rehabilitation work, an official of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) said on Sunday.

The area straddling the eighth to 14th station of the cross on the side of Barangay Ayala in Magalang town will be temporarily closed for 30 days, according to Laudemir Salac, DENR officer in Pampanga.

He said the 14th station up to the summit, both accessed via Magalang and Barangay Lacquios in Arayat town, will also be shut down for 45 days.

The DENR, Samahan ng mga Magsasaka sa Mataas na Lupa ng Ayala Inc. (SMAMLI) and volunteers will clean the trail from the jump-off point to the summit, which spans more that 50 kilometers.

Tour guides will be trained and accredited by the Department of Tourism while a livelihood center is turned over to SMAMLI, said Salac, who also chairs the Protected Area Management Board in the province.

Single-use plastics

He said charcoal making, slash-and-burn farming and dump-making remain prohibited in the trail under the Expanded National Integrated Protected Area Systems Act of 2018 that strengthens the conservation of 97 ecologically critical areas, including Mt. Arayat.

Single-use plastics are now banned on the 1,026-meter tall inactive volcano.

Salac said that once it’s reopened in June, the DENR would require visitors to sign a waiver spelling out their agreement with policies protecting the environs of Mt. Arayat. The DENR’s Ecosystem Research and Development Bureau is being asked to determine the carrying capacity of the mountain.

Pampanga Rep. Aurelio Gonzales has a pending bill converting the place into a protected landscape. It became a national park in 1933.