The Commission on Audit (COA) slammed the "mismanaged" Forestland Management Project (FMP) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) with some of the agroforestry sites converted into vegetable gardens.

Worse, the produce in the vegetable gardens were not harvested and thus wasted, the COA said in its 2024 annual report.

It also said that the insufficient monitoring of the turned-over FMP sites only undermined the accomplishment of the project and ultimately wasted the funds that were utilized.

The FMP is a 12-year joint project of the Philippine government with JICA through the DENR. It concluded on July 3, 2024.

During those years, the COA said that the project carried out reforestation activities to increase forest cover in the country by providing People's Organization (PO) beneficiaries with training and orientations to strengthen forest and enterprise management capacity.

However, the COA said that when its audit team inspected the FMP sites in Nueva Vizcaya and Ifugao, it was found that the 100-hectare agroforestry site awarded to Tuppan-Balisyon Upland Farmers Association (TBUFAI) was already converted into a vegetable plantation.

It said that while a third-party team reported an 88.6 percent survival rate on April 1, 2024, the conversion might have been done by the beneficiary after inspection.

"Discussions with the concerned officials and employees revealed that due to the completion of FMP in July 2024, there have been limited monitoring of turned-over FMP sites," the COA’s report stated.

Also, it said “there were no more appropriations received for the FMP during the year and allocations received from DENR Central/Regional Office were primarily for the payment of outstanding obligations of the project."

On the other hand, the agroforestry site in Lagawe, Ifugao was planted to fruit trees integrated with forest trees, the COA said.

But it said that cacao fruits were not harvested and were left rotten on trees, which resulted in spoilage.

Thus, it said, "the supposed benefits, that is additional income to PO beneficiaries, that could have been derived therefrom did not materialize."

It added that when PO members were asked, they replied that harvesting the cacao fruits would only be a waste of effort as there is little demand and very low selling price within their community.

The COA said: "Linkages across POs and potential markets are fundamental in increasing not just the profitability, but also the sustainability of agroforestry. A well-established value chain creates opportunities for POs for more stable markets, reduces wastes and offers better prices for their products, thereby, increasing their profitability in the long run."

It recommended that the Provincial Environment and Natural Resources Office (PENRO) of Nueva Vizcaya should include in its yearly targets the conduct of monitoring of turned-over FMP sites in order to sustain the project's accomplishments.

It also asked the DENR to strengthen its networking and linkages among POs and other potential markets in order to avoid wastage of fruits and crops, and to collaborate with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and Department of Science and Technology (DOST) to boost the sustainability of PO enterprises.