Meet Cel Tungol, champion of PH native trees

Today we are featuring a lady who is passionate about the conservation of Philippine native trees. Meet Arceli Tungol. She is a member of the Protected Area Management Board; Founder of Philippine Native Tree Enthusiasts (PNTE); and a trustee (Luzon representative) of the Foundation for the Philippine Environment Board.

We had a chance to interview her online and here is that conversation.

Meet Cel Tungol, champion of PH native trees

You completed a degree in Business Administration and Economics from UP and worked in Citibank for 26 years until you retired in 2017. How did you get involved with environmental conservation? I often watch National Geographic and hoped to see those places with majestic animals. In my early 30’s I decided to get certified as an advance scuba diver and got the chance to see the beautiful corals and fishes that take refuge in Philippines waters. After two years of scuba diving, I decided to explore the wonderful world of birds through bird watching and bird photography. Over the years I observed that there are more birds in our natural forests or where more Philippine native trees grow in places like Subic, Olongapo and Los Banos, Laguna.

I was then fortunate to have met the late Leonard Co, an educator at the University of the Philippines and the premier botanist in the Philippines, who was a strong advocate of Philippine native trees. He has inspired me to learn and advocate the mainstreaming of Philippine native trees. Hence, aside from bird photography, I also took photos of trees around to get to know them.

One of my photographs was chosen to be the front cover of the Philippine Native Trees 101 book by the Green Covergence Inc. It was an accidental photo of a tree in bloom which I did not even know it was our National Tree, the Narra. I felt guilty that while I know that our National Tree is Narra, I have not really seen one up close and personal and yet it was a very beautiful tree with its fragrant yellow blooms studded all over the tree.

Hence, I began to search for more native trees and advocate their promotion and preservation. As the late Leonard Co said, “We cannot protect what we don’t know.”

What are the challenges in environmental conservation, and how do you think we can address these?

Environmental conservation is a very huge task to take and one person cannot do it alone. It has a lot of facets such as the land, water, air, animals, plants, waste management, pollution control etc. One has to focus on one key aspect of the environment. I think my focus is on conservation of our Philippine native trees which is critical to a healthy environment. By educating more individuals about the importance of our Philippine native trees, we can collectively help in advocating and planting more of our fast diminishing native trees.

You are the founder of the Philippine Native Tree Enthusiasts Facebook group which marked its 10th anniversary recently. Can you tell us the story of PNTE? The creation of PNTE was inspired by the late Leonard Co. He was my mentor and go-to person in tree identification. When he passed on in 2010, it became difficult for me to get trees identified due to the limited number of people around me who are passionate on native trees. This prompted me to create PNTE in Facebook in 2013 for wider reach hoping that there are more people outside my circle of friends who know native trees and who are equally as curious as I am on native trees. I started posting photos of trees I encountered in my walks and luckily someone would be able to identify the trees. Native tree enthusiasts started to join and appreciated the identification of trees. They too posted the trees in their neighborhood which they have been wondering about its identity. I was just surprised that people from various walks of life joined and have been wanting to know the tree at the corner or around their neighborhood.

Why should we plant Philippine Native Trees? What can we do to advocate for PH native trees? Philippine native trees support our unique biodiversity. They are adapted to our weather conditions – strong typhoons and long drought. They provide food to both humans and wildlife. They are a source of medicines like treatment for cough, diabetes and other illness. More research needs to be made on its potential.

Our Philippine native trees have been neglected. Filipinos do not know their native trees, its value and potential to the people. Due to lack of knowledge most native trees are considered weeds or useless to humans but in reality to provide food and shelter to a number of flora and fauna. With land development, our native trees are removed to be replaced with exotic species which may not support our unique biodiverisity.

We can help advocate for Philippine native trees through family and friends as well as in your circles of influence. Start the learning journey on native tree, create a mini nursery of native trees, plant more native trees instead of exotic ones, create a native tree garden/park as a living legacy.