Mayor Cristina “Tin” Antonio is a lawyer and the Local Chief Executive of the Municipality of Alcala, in Cagayan Valley Province. She is known as one of the present municipal mayors who is passionate and strong-willed in pushing her advocacy for the environment. Hence the “Green Wall of Alcala” is one of her administration’s priority agenda, which aims to rebuild a 30-meter vegetation shield from the riverbanks along the Cagayan and Pared Rivers in her town with a science-based approach using Philippine Native Trees.
She started the Green Wall of Alcala back in December 2019, after their town experienced the horrific “100-Year Flood” which devastated lives and submerged properties in a raging 15m high flood. This disaster recurred again in November 2020, just a span of 11 months, during the onslaught of Typhoon Ulysses.
Thus, in order to effectively implement this massive and urgent undertaking, Mayor Tin Antonio appealed for the participation and commitment of all community stakeholders and members. Now, the Green Wall of Alcala Project encompasses the entire municipality, not just in the river banks, but even in the town proper, schools, barangays, and even along national roads. Currently they were able to put up a Municipal Native Tree Nursery, and planted a total of 7,136 native trees along the roads of Alcala. They also assigned each of the 25 barangays of the town their signature native tree which will serve as their identity, and will be planted by residents in their respective backyards. Furthermore, what makes it more interesting and commendable is that each of the barangay also identified an area of land and started putting up a pocket forest using the Miyaki Method.
Now, the fate of their municipality lies in the success of the Green Wall of Alcala Project, and the collective commitment of each citizen, to withstand the rage of nature.