Early estimates put the environmental damage from the Oriental Mindoro oil spill at P7 billion, Environment Secretary Antonia Yulo Loyzaga said on Wednesday.
In a TV interview, Loyzaga said the amount was based on the initial calculation by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) of “what could be exposed by way of coral reefs, seagrasses, mangroves and fisheries.”
“The possible exposure area for us is P7 billion,” Loyzaga said, referring to the initial estimated cost of the environmental damage caused by the oil spill from MT Princess Empress, which sank off the waters of Oriental Mindoro two months ago.
She said the DENR would need to “actually go underneath and verify” the data once it is safe to dive in waters affected by the oil spill.
“We’re not allowed to fish in the area. We’re also not allowed to dive yet, but we want to do that immediately because we want to observe what the physical impacts are,” Loyzaga said.
“What we have to do now is verify on the ground how much of these reefs have actually been touched, how many of the mangroves have actually been destroyed, and how many of the seagrasses have actually been affected,” she added.
The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) on Thursday offered a lower figure, saying the oil spill did P3.88 billion worth of damage and affected 40,000 families.
The estimated cost of damage included production losses among some 24,000 fishermen and farmers, the NDRRMC said in a report.
Fishermen have been ordered to stay ashore in several areas while the oil spill cleanup is ongoing.
Mimaropa accounted for the bulk of the cost of damage at around P3.75 billion, while the rest was recorded in Calabarzon and Western Visayas, the disaster agency said.
The Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) earlier said thefisheries sector loses around P19 million daily as the oil spill damage drags on.
The NDRRMC report also said 40,897 families or 193,436 individuals were affected by the oil spill caused by a tanker that went down in rough seas on Feb. 28.
The government, local authorities and non-government organizations have provided P140 million worth of assistance to affected residents, the social welfare department said in a separate statement.
The Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) earlier said that the oil leak fromMT Princess Empress was “significantly controlled” with cleanup efforts 74 percent to 80 percent complete.
PCG said in a Facebook post that its incident management team has completed 74.82 percent of its cleanup efforts in Naujan town, while the cleanup at Pola town was 80.71 percent complete.
“The oil spill response team said they cleaned 28 out of 34 kilometers of affected shoreline in Pola and five out of seven kilometers in Naujan,” the PCG said.
Three barangays in Pola town were also declared 100 percent clean: Tiguihan, Zone 1, and Zone 2.
Despite this, the PCG noted that some seven kilometers of shoreline in Pola and two kilometers in Naujan were still contaminated with oil. Charles Dantes and Rio Araja
Other government agencies, meanwhile, continued cleaning up the affected shorelines by flushing, pressure washing on hard surfaces, pebble washing, and manual cleaning.
The report came more than two months after the oil tanker MT Princess Empress sank off the coast of Oriental Mindoro while carrying 800,000 liters of industrial fuel.