Legarda calls for stronger protection for environmental defenders

MANILA, Philippines — Stronger measures are needed to protect environmental defenders from attacks and address the land and resource conflicts that place communities at risk, Sen. Loren Legarda said in a statement on Tuesday, noting that Global Witness had documented 12 killings in the Philippines in 2025, the highest number recorded outside Latin America that year.

“Environmental defenders” don’t refer only to activists. Those at risk can be farmers defending their land, indigenous communities protecting ancestral domains, or residents raising concerns about projects that may affect their water, livelihoods, forests, and communities.

“No one should have to risk their life simply for raising these concerns,” Legarda said.

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Accountability and prevention

Legarda cited the findings released by Global Witness on Sept. 16, 2026, in its report “Collective Power: The Struggle for Protection for Land and Environmental Defenders”

According to that report, at least 124 land and environmental defenders were killed worldwide in 2025, bringing to 2,375 killings and long-term disappearances it has documented since it began its annual reporting in 2012.

The organization has described the Philippines as the deadliest country in Asia for people protecting land and the environment since 2012.

Globally, the report said, land disputes were linked to more than half of the killings documented in 2025, while mining was the deadliest identified sector, with 11 related killings, four of them in the Philippines.

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“People who ask if their farms would be lost, if rivers would be affected, or if the land they inherited from their ancestors will be protected should not be considered enemies of progress. Communities have the right to be heard when decisions can permanently affect the places where they live and the resources they depend on,” Legarda said in a mix of Filipino and English.

Protecting environmental defenders, she stressed, requires both accountability when attacks occur and prevention before disputes turn violent.

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“But protection must also begin much earlier by respecting land and resource rights, involving affected communities in decisions, and identifying environmental and social risks before projects are approved,” she said.

Environmental protection measures

To address the issues related to environmental protection, Legarda has pursued measures.

She has filed Senate Bill No. 311, or the proposed Indigenous Community Conserved Territories and Areas Act, which seeks to recognize the community-conserved territories and areas of Indigenous Peoples and cultural communities and establish a national framework for their recognition and protection.

This approach is also reflected in the Expanded National Integrated Protected Areas System Act of 2018, or Republic Act No. 11038, which Legarda principally authored and co-sponsored. The law strengthened the protection and management of ecologically important areas and provided a stronger legal framework for conserving the country’s biodiversity.

Legarda is also pushing for Senate Bill No. 1251, or the proposed Philippine Environmental Assessment System Act, which seeks to establish a comprehensive system for evaluating the environmental consequences of policies, programs, plans, and projects and to create a National Environmental Protection Agency.

For Legarda, environmental assessment should include prevent communities from discovering the consequences of a project only after damage has already occurred.

READ: PH is most unsafe country for environmentalists in Asia

“Environmental assessment must identify those risks early, and the people who will live with the consequences must be heard,” she said.

Legarda stressed that the country’s record cited by Global Witness shows why environmental protection must include both strong laws and real protection for the people who defend natural resources on the ground.

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“Environmental protection depends on whether people can speak up when their land, water, forests, or livelihoods are threatened without putting their lives at risk. A farmer, an Indigenous leader, or any member of a community should be able to raise legitimate concerns and expect government to respond before those concerns escalate into violence or irreversible harm,” Legarda said. /amt