Chemicals being dumped in Sulu Sea?

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines — Residents of Tawi-Tawi province have sought assistance over alleged dumping of tons of chemicals in the Sulu Sea as part of an "ocean cleansing" project of an international organization. Governor Sadikul A. Sahali claimed Ocean Nourishment Corp. (ONC) did not inform his office of the plan to dump tons of chemicals, specifically urea, into the province’s seas. The company, in its Web site http://www.oceannourishment.com/, described itself as "an ethical organization established with the dual goals of managing planet-wide greenhouse gas concentrations and providing protein-rich food for malnourished populations." Officials of the company listed on the Web site could not be contacted for comment. BusinessWorld also repeatedly tried to contact Malcolm I. Sarmiento, Jr., director of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, to clarify if his agency has cleared ONC’s operation, but he was not immediately available for interview. Mr. Sahali said seaweed farmers and fisherfolk in his province are complaining of contamination and the diseases that have inflicted seaweed farms. Tawi-Tawi, which is the top producer of dried seaweed and high-value commercial fishes in the country, is near the cleansing operation of ONC. In a document posted on the Web site of the Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment, it was noted that ONC plans to dump 500 tons of urea (nitrogen) into the Sulu Sea for a large scale "carbon sequestration" experiment. It said the dumping of urea will clean the industrial waste and agricultural runoff in the sea. Mr. Sahali said the ONC has already dumped 100 tons of urea in Sulu Sea. — Darwin T. Wee, BusinessWorld