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Community leader Nida Collado has been honoured with the prestigious Wangari Maathai Forest Champions Award 2024 for her commitment to forest conservation and community empowerment in the Philippines.
The award was given to her by Collaborative Partnership on Forests (CPF), an international alliance founded by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO). She was presented the honour at a ceremony held during the 27th Session of the Committee on Forestry in Rome, Italy, which began on July 22 and will end on July 26, 2024.
“Collado’s passion and innovative thinking have created lasting and positive change in forest management and restoration of mangroves — she is an inspiration for all of us,” said FAO Director-General QU Dongyu.
The Wangari Maathai Forest Champions Award honours individuals for their pioneering efforts to promote community forest management, which includes indigenous communities and all forest users. The CPF established it in 2012 in memory of Kenyan environmentalist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai, with a $20,000 cash prize.
Collado is the president of the Macatumbalen Community-Based Forest and Coastal Management Association (MBFCMA), which promotes community-centred conservation by leveraging local knowledge and grassroots efforts to restore and protect valuable ecosystems.
Since 2002, she has led transformative initiatives in San Vicente, Palawan, located in the Philippines’ western region. Under her leadership, the MBFCMA successfully reforested 1,450 hectares of degraded land while protecting 400 hectares of standing forests and community water supplies. These efforts not only restored biodiversity but also enhanced local communities’ livelihoods, demonstrating the transformative power of sustainable practices.
The Philippines has experienced significant deforestation over the past century and has lost approximately 10 million hectares of forest cover over the course of the 20th century. By 1988, forest cover had declined to just 18.9 per cent of the total land area. Forest decline was most blatant in the 1970s-80s, placing the Philippines at the top of the list of countries with the highest deforestation rates within the Asia-Pacific region. Commercial logging in the area began in the 1980s and it has severely degraded the natural forests.
Locals formed the MBFCMA in 1997 and in 2002, they signed a 25-year agreement to conserve, protect and sustainably use 1,850 hectares (4,571 acres) of forest.
The community faced challenges such as low seedling survival rates, poaching, illegal wildlife trafficking and destructive farming practices when Typhoon Rai in December 2021 further worsened the situation. Collado educated local farmers about the dangers of slash and burn farming and organised community groups to promote community responsibility in forest and mangrove conservation.
One of her groundbreaking contributions is the restoration of fragmented mangroves by creating interconnected pockets managed by local village communities, blending traditional wisdom with modern conservation approaches. This approach not only enhances the ecological integrity of the mangrove ecosystem but also establishes fisher-friendly pathways that support local livelihoods.
“From the few believers we had when we started to being heard at the national level and now standing here on the global stage, this journey has been incredibly meaningful for me and those who believed in and supported me. Winning the Wangari Maathai Forest Champions Award proves that our efforts are worth cultivating and expanding,” Collado said in a statement released by FAO.
Cécile Ndjebet, a Cameroonian activist, received the award in 2022 for conserving forests and promoting women’s rights to land and forest resources.