Heo/Geo Lecture Series 2025-08: Trina Isorena on the consultative process towards landscape management and restoration

Consistent with one of the extension goals of the UP Department of Geography, which is to engage with local government units and communities, and forge partnership activities, this month's talk for the Heo/Geo Lecture Series highlights the partnership aspect in relation to landscape management and restoration. 

For the eighth Heo/Geo Lecture Series, this talk draws from the experience of the Protect Wildlife Project, which developed an iterative method for piloting and scaling up Payments for Ecosystems Services (PES) as a means of securing additional funding for landscape restoration and management. These case study landscapes are located in the watersheds of Mt. Mantalingahan Protected Landscape in southern Palawan, Mount Matutum Protected Landscape in South Cotabato, and Bataan National Park in Bagac, Bataan. The talk which will be presented by Dr Trina Isorena is titled Paying for Nature’s Work: Cost-Based Valuation Strategy to Support Local PES. The lecture is jointly sponsored by the Philippine Geographical Society and the UP Department of Geography and will happen on Friday, 29 August 2025 at 5:30PM PHT. 

The talk details the establishment of landscape-based PES systems starting from framework development, piloting, and replication to diversify the sources of funds for watershed protection, restoration, development, and management. It also includes the processes involved in setting up multiple PES agreements between watershed and protected area managers, as well as users and consumers of ecosystem goods and services. 

Dr Trina Isorena is currently a senior lecturer at the UP Department of Geography where she handled graduate and undergraduate courses on river systems and watersheds, as well as digital cartography. Trina specializes in natural resource management, spatial planning, and the application of GIScience to environmental governance. Her interests include rural water management, land cover change analysis, REDD+ national forest monitoring system, resource tenure, community-based natural resource management, indigenous peoples’ rights, and ancestral domain mapping.

In her role as the Protect Wildlife Project’s Spatial Planning and GIS Manager, Dr Isorena contributed to the interdisciplinary team that developed the said PES system.

The monthly Heo/Geo Lecture Series was first conceived as a Brown Bag Colloquium and later easing into Geography Webbynar during the pandemic period. It was later rebranded as the Heo/Geo Lecture Series to capture not only the multiplicities of the discipline's specializations, but also on how it is pronounced in light of the increasing directive to provide space for geography's vernacularisation. Formally, the Heo/Geo Lecture Series is a discipline-based hobnobs where geography (as well as geography-adjacent) studies, extension and community work, industry pep talks, and spatial practices come together to meet and discuss. Sponsored by the Environment and Development Geographies (EDGE) research group of the UP Department of Geography, the talk is in line with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals #6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), #11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), #14 (Life Below Water), #15 (Life on Land). 

To participate in Dr Isorena's lecture, please register via this link or just click this: https://tinyurl.com/6zwurcef 

Faculty & Staff Planning Workshop 2025 in Mataas na Kahoy, Batangas

The UP Department of Geography is currently in a 3-day planning workshop for staff and faculty. The workshop is being held in Mataas na Kahoy's Shercon Resort in Batangas.

                     Clockwise from left: KS, MS, FFH, MSM, JP, EG, MCH, DG, CB, DSA, CC, ACC, JRC, LAO, YL, VJA, ES, AG

The first workshop focuses on Quality Assessment and post-iAADs (Internal Academic Assessment and Development System) evaluation that tracks the department's academic and extension outputs consistent with its vision and goal. Two other workshops focus on graduate and undergraduate concerns ranging to admission and curriculum mapping. Faculty resources in relation to student demand will be assessed in terms of future recruitment. The graduate program (the current MS Geography and the proposed PhD program in geography) hopes to dip from the deep pool of faculty with PhDs. Finally, professional development including faculty development and succession plans will be reevaluated with the return of faculty with PhDs and new full-time and part-time (at least temporarily) hires.

Staff development involves streamlining everyday administrative tasks. The Department recognizes and appreciates the contribution of the department's non-teaching staff in relation to carrying out the complicated programming of everyday departmental activities.

The workshop also allowed time for the members of staff and faculty to perfect their synchronized swimming skills.

Photos & Video: YL & JP

2025 Geography 192 Team Caluya conducts P3DM in Barangay Sabang, Caluya Island, Province of Antique, July 16-18, 2025

Is the inclusion of diverse local knowledges a guarantee that there will be shared stewardship of the community? Can community mapping help redefine social cohesion in relation to risk and disaster? 

                  Figure 1: A panoramic view of Sabang shoreline (photo: D. Gutierrez)

When the Participatory 3D Mapping (P3DM) was introduced by the UP Department of Geography through the Geography 192 (Field Methods) class to Barangay Sabang in Caluya Island, Province of Antique, the response from the community was immediate and enthusiastic. P3DM has the potential to be transformative in translating the knowledge systems of the community into something materially concrete where the community themselves can take an active role in updating the 3D map based on shifting demographics and environmental changes. 

                                   Figure 2: 3D topographical model of Barangay Sabang (photo: E. Garcia)

Taking place from July 16-18, 2025 and with close coordination with the Caluya Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction Management Office (MDRRMO) and Municipal Planning and Development Office (MPDO), a 3D model of Barangay Sabang was co-created by community participants with the assistance of the Geog 192 class under the supervision of three UP Geography professors. Mapping and plotting households were undertaken along with identified vulnerabilities and locally-derived capacities. The 3-day activity not only identified the hazards specific to the area but also conducted a risk assessment of the community. 

                     Figure 3A: Community at work in assembling the 3D map (photo: V.A. Imperial)

   Figure 3B: A barangay health worker and a kagawad consult with Jia Garcia in assembling the 3D map (photo: D. Gutierrez)

Like most community endeavors that place premium on local knowledge, capacity-building, and giving agency to the community to undertake their own plans mindful of the barangay’s vulnerabilities and capacities, P3DM allows them to take an active role in assessing and planning their mitigation strategies in the event of a disaster.

                     Figure 4: The community participants, members of the LGU, and the UP Department of Geography posed in front of the completed 3D map (photo: V.A. Imperial). 

So to respond to the question posed above, local knowledges alone will not guarantee successful stewardship of the environment, it is in the empowerment of local decision-making that the community’s sustainable futures can be achieved. 

Acknowledgements: MPDO head Carlo Caballero, EnP; MDRRMO head Juniffer Ysug; Sabang barangay captain Joel Alvarez; Geography 192 field class students Stephen Gaius Buenaventura, Juvirn Mae Garcia, Vinz Angelo Imperial, Florence Mikhail Dale Lazarte, Christian Mark Lobo, Glendale Lovitos, Hannah Sophia Melendrez, Knisha Ysabelle Payuran, Jose Antonio Miguel Santisteban, Justine Ravert Tan, Luis Miguel Teran, Ureil Rey Toledo; and the UP Geography professors Emmanuel Garcia, EnP (team leader), Darlene Gutierrez PhD, Joseph Palis PhD.