Can REDD+ deliver for Philippines’ Iraya Mangyan?

In Puerto Galera, Philippines, Iraya Mangyan patroller Bernito Pampilo and colleagues walk dangerous daily routes through a UNESCO biosphere reserve as part of a REDD+ carbon program meant to conserve over 40,000 hectares of ancestral forest and support roughly 2,500 households. The Mindoro Forest and Biodiversity Conservation Programme, run 2020 to 2049 by the Center for Conservation Innovations Philippines, pairs ancestral-domain recognition and Indigenous governance with carbon monitoring across more than 30 hectares of tagged and measured trees.

Locals and officials say the program appears to be reducing threats to the forest, but the piece is blunt that the promised carbon-credit revenue remains unrealized — key agreements, independent verification, and payouts are all still pending. Pampilo's salary currently comes from private donations funneled through the program, not from any carbon-market payoff.

Community leaders describe years of consultation needed to overcome justified suspicion left by past conservation projects that failed to deliver, and a 2023 consent certificate finally let the partnership proceed. The story frames genuine, patient trust-building against a financial mechanism that, so far, has produced patrols and paperwork rather than the resources it was designed to unlock.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.