By: Atty. Gregorio B. Austral, CPA
A cautious court stops an ambitious Talong:
The Precautionary Principle in action
LGUs would have received a substantial increase in their National Tax Allocation
(NTA) had it not been because of the pandemic. With an increased budget, local
governments may be tempted to implement big projects. Before implementing these
projects, LGUs are exhorted to be conscious of the negative impact of their planned
projects on the environment.
One important consideration that LGUs must consider as a matter of policy is the
precautionary principle. The principle traces its history in Germany in the 1960s,
expressing the normative idea that governments are obligated to “foresee and forestall”
harm to the environment. The Court noted Principle 15 of the Rio Declaration on
Environment and Development codified the precautionary approach, in this wise:
“In order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach shall be widely
applied by States according to their capabilities. Where there are threats of serious or
irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for
postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.”
The Supreme Court, in the Bt Talong case decided years ago, identified the
conditions for the application of the precautionary principle as follows:
For purposes of evidence, the precautionary principle should be treated as a
principle of last resort, where application of the regular Rules of Evidence would cause
in an inequitable result for the environmental plaintiff – (a) settings in which the risks of
harm are uncertain; (b) settings in which harm might be irreversible and what is lost is
irreplaceable; and (c) settings in which the harm that might result would be serious.
When these features – uncertainty, the possibility of irreversible harm, and the
possibility of serious harm – coincide, the case for the precautionary principle is
strongest. When in doubt, cases must be resolved in favor of the constitutional right to
a balanced and healthful ecology. Parenthetically, judicial adjudication is one of the
strongest fora in which the precautionary principle may find applicability.
The presence of the conditions of uncertainty, the possibility of irreversible harm
and the possibility of serious harm are sufficient grounds for the courts to issue
injunctive reliefs.