The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and the National Bicycle Organization (NBO) will lead this year's celebration of the "National Bicycle Day" on Sunday, Nov. 28.
This year's event has the theme "Cleaner air through bicycle-friendly Philippines" and will now be on its seventh iteration.
"With climate change, everything we do counts in large amounts and that the remarkable increase in Filipinos discovering the bicycle as a mode of transport and cycling as a way of life is a big boost to our climate change resiliency and adaptation under the mantle of Proclamation 1052," DENR Sec. Roy Cimatu said Friday, Nov. 26.
In 2020, President Duterte signed Proclamation 1052 declaring fourth Sunday of November of every year as the National Bicycle Day to ensure ecological integrity and promote a clean and healthy environment.
As part of this year's celebration, a 26-kilometer bike parade called "A Celebration for the Presidential Proclamation 1052 Declaration" will be held.
The parade will start from the DENR grounds in Quezon City and end at the Centennial Park in Barangay Bagumbayan North in Navotas City where a short program will be conducted.
DENR Usec. Benny Antiporda is expected to give a keynote address during the program.
Other activities that will highlight this year’s celebration include coastal cleanup, lectures on bike road safety, and turnover of three free bike racks to the local government of Navotas City.
Unlike in the past years, only 300 bikers are set to participate in this year's celebration due to coronavirus disease (COVID-19) restrictions, Antiporda said.
"This is a far cry from the number of participants in the yearly DENR-NBO organized event before the pandemic, which averaged around 10,000 in Metro Manila alone," he said.
During its launch in 2014, around 30,000 bikers joined the celebration of the National Bicycle Day.