MAYNILAD REFORESTS 626 HECTARES SINCE 2007

West Zone concessionaire Maynilad Water Services, Inc. (Maynilad) has already covered 626 hectares of denuded forest lands and coastal areas with trees and mangroves since 2007 through its “Plant for Life” reforestation program.

Under the program, the company was able to plant more than 692,000 indigenous trees over 585 hectares of the Ipo and La Mesa watersheds as of August 2021, and more than 200,000 mangrove propagules over 41 hectares of Manila Bay’s coastline covering Muntinlupa City and Malabon City; and Cavite City, Bacoor, Rosario, Noveleta and Kawit in Cavite Province.

Maynilad has also intensified its watershed monitoring activities, which boosted the survival rate of the planted trees to an average of 80 percent over the last three years.

Planting trees in denuded portions of the watersheds helps to prevent soil erosion, thus protecting the quality of water stored in the dams that supply water for millions of consumers. It also helps with carbon sequestration, which is essential to reducing the greenhouse gases that lead to global warming.

“This program enabled Maynilad to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by around 25,000 tons per year,” said Maynilad President and CEO Ramoncito S. Fernandez. “Together with the rest of the MVP group of companies, we are ramping up our reforestation initiatives to attain ‘net-zero carbon’ by 2040.”

Maynilad taps its employees, as well as interested personnel from like-minded organizations, to participate in its annual tree-planting activity. Besides its reforestation and afforestation efforts, Maynilad has also made an initial foray into renewable energy with its recent energization of a solar farm to supply power for its La Mesa Pumping Station.

Maynilad is the largest private water concessionaire in the Philippines in terms of customer base. It is a concessionaire of the MWSS for the West Zone of the Greater Manila Area, which is composed of the cities of Manila (certain portions), Quezon City (certain portions), Makati (west of South Super Highway), Caloocan, Pasay, Parañaque, Las Piñas, Muntinlupa, Valenzuela, Navotas and Malabon all in Metro Manila; the cities of Cavite, Bacoor and Imus, and the towns of Kawit, Noveleta and Rosario, all in Cavite Province.