Tanduay
president Lucio “Bong” Tan, Jr. has been actively supporting grassroots sports
through an initiative known as Tanduay Athletics. Tan is the backer of Batangas
Tanduay Athletics that is now the team lording over the Maharlika Pilipinas
Basketball League (MPBL) founded by Sen. Manuel Pacquioa. The league replaced a former regional
basketball league that supports grassroots basketball.
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| Lucio ‘Bong’ Tan Jr. and Gerry Tee |
Beyond
sports, Tan is also passionate about green initiatives. He himself was on top
of the transformation to a zero-waste facility of Absolut Distillers, Tanduay’s
alcohol distillery based in Lian, Batangas. The facility bagged numerous
environmental awards, including the prestigious Green Apple Awards, an annual
international campaign to recognize, reward and promote environmental best
practices around the world. Absolut Distillers is the only local distillery to
have received this award up to this day. The company likewise has since been a
recipient of awards by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources
(DENR) for their outstanding environment conservation practices.
“We understand the need to lessen our impact by making our
operations cleaner and greener. We do not just want to make the best rhum in
the Philippines, bet we want everyone to know that our rhum is made with good
intentions and we hope to improve our operations year after year,” Tan
continued, adding that, they have started investing in solar energy as a cleaner
alternative as well. “We want our consumers to know that every bottle of
Tanduay that they drink is made from green intentions and green energy.”
The Tanduay
president further shared that the concern for the environment sprang from the
knowledge that the distillery industry is considered as one of the dirtiest.
“Before we took over Tanduay, there have been cases filed against its practices
pertaining to pollution. We said, let us clean up first. We started investing
in technologies that we are using in our Absolut distillery in Batangas in
order to reduce our carbon footprint. It was a long process, and we did it.”
Now, Tan
would like to bring public attention to a project he started in 2011 to protect
what little is left of the old Boracay. The island has been noted as one of the
world’s top destinations, but it has encountered controversy lately due to the
amount of pollution that has been plaguing the once-pristine paradise. There
are talks of a government shutdown to tourists in order to rehabilitate the
natural landscape. Tan pioneered the
project “Roots for Boracay” to save the last mangroves in the island. “When we
first got there, we already saw the amount of solid waste that lay among the
mangroves. Before we started reforesting the area, we needed to have it cleaned
up,” Tan revealed.
He noted
that if the mangroves have not been cut down indiscriminately, the problems
being faced by Boracay today would have been much lesser. There would be no
need to set up expensive artificial waste treatment facilities for the island’s
recovery, as the mangrove roots will naturally filter water waste. According to
him, Boracay is far from any of his business interests, but the need to respond
to an impending crisis was what drove him to act.
“It took
awhile to bring together the various people who will help us in our quest to
get hold of the right to implement our project to clean up and re-plant in
order to stop the continuous degradation of the mangroves in that area of
Boracay,” Tan further related.
But Tan had
the right man on his side to make sure his visions will be realized. Gerry Tee
is the chief operating officer of Absolut Distillers. He is the same person
with whom his father Lucio Tan Sr. entrusted the green transformation of the
Batangas alcohol distillery. With the help of Tee, they engaged the Tan Yan Kee
Foundation led by Philip Sing to gather a 200-strong workforce that began the
clean up efforts in Barangay Manoc Manoc, where the mangroves are located. They
have gathered four truckloads of garbage by the time they finish cleaning the
mangroves area.
“To protect
Boracay, it is important to go down to its roots. In this case, we seek the
last frontier of Boracay – the mangroves. It is where the fish and other sea
creatures get nutrients, it is where life starts. Without the mangroves, the
island would also cease to exist, as it protects the island from typhoons. The
beautiful fine white sand will go back to the sea because their roots are the ones
holding the island together,” Tee explained.
He added
that aside from building the infrastructures and replanting mangroves, the
mission of the project is to showcase that part of Boracay that is often
neglected, so people can know what it takes to protect the beaches that
tourists love so much.
The project
had partnered with the local government unit, the DENR and concerned
non-government organizations to come up with a sustainable development in the
area which involves the locals, educating them about the importance of the
mangroves to their island. “So much has been cut down to make way for real
estate, others cut them down for firewood. A portion is also dying out, because
a road development cut off water supply. With Roots For Boracay, people have begun to
understand what needs to be done,” said Tee.
The Tanduay
executives underscored that it is not about the company, which has also
instituted other environmental campaigns in partnership with the Tan Yang Kee
Foundation such as The Canopy Project, which replants trees in the denuded
forests in the North. “Boracay is only part of the market for Tanduay, we are
more concerned about our legacy. It is not about Tanduay, it is about the
locals – their subsistence, their livelihood, and their existence. Tanduay is
just there as a vehicle to raise awareness,” Tee said.
They
cautioned that if the lack of concern for the environment continues in the name
of profit, Boracay will not be the only one. “If Boracay is closed down, people
will move on to Palawan. This has happened before, just look at how Matabungkay
deteriorated,” Tee admonished. “The issue is lack of awareness, and we are
trying to address that with our project.”
They said
that the plans of shutting down Boracay will hurt a lot, but from their
perspective of what they have seen in the mangrove forest, it could be a
one-step-backward, two-steps-forward situation. “It is about moving forward,
and we can all help in our own little way, by doing things like picking up a
cigarette butt and not throwing your garbage just anywhere,” Tee said.
“It was a
directive from the Chairman, Mr. Lucio Tan to follow the concept of sustainable
development, where we do not profit at the expense of the environment. We make
sure that everything we do is about reducing our carbon footprint and become
more independent from the environment where we do not use to dump our waste,“
Tee further shared.
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