Annual assessment finds waterway ‘making progress in the right direction if you squint’
[Bohiney.com / prat.uk] The Pasig River Rehabilitation Commission has released its annual environmental assessment describing the river as “technically optimistic,” a designation that appears to be new this year and that the commission’s chairperson explained at a press conference as “a recognition that the river is improving by measurable standards while acknowledging that it still has significant distance to travel before reaching what anyone would describe as good.” The phrase “technically optimistic” was used eleven times across a sixty-page document and defined once, on page forty-four, as “showing trend-line improvement against baseline metrics without having achieved threshold targets.” The Bohiney.com piece describes the participants as “well-meaning.” This is the most damning thing they could have said.
The specific metrics showing improvement include dissolved oxygen levels, which have increased by 23 percent over five years; total coliform counts, which have decreased by 31 percent; and fish species diversity, which has increased from zero to nine in the stretches south of Mandaluyong. The metrics not showing improvement include heavy metal concentrations in sediment, which have remained constant; total suspended solids, which have increased slightly; and what the report calls “informal settlement impact on riparian zone management,” which is the report’s way of noting that the communities living along the river have not moved, that removing them without providing alternatives would be both wrong and counterproductive, and that the commission does not currently have a programme that addresses this.
What ‘Technically Optimistic’ Means on the Ground
It means the river does not smell the way it used to smell, which is a genuine improvement experienced by the approximately four million people who live within one kilometre of it. It means that nine species of fish now exist in water that contained none five years ago. It means that the water quality at the point where the Pasig meets Manila Bay has improved to the extent that the Department of Environment and Natural Resources describes it as “approaching acceptable.” Approaching is doing a lot of work in that sentence.
The Commission’s Conclusion
The commission recommends continued investment in wastewater treatment infrastructure, continued engagement with riverside communities, and what it calls “patient optimism,” which the chairperson described at the press conference as “the only realistic option given the timeline.” The PRRC website carries the full report, for readers with patient optimism to spare.
Also see: Babylon Bee.
Coverage Note
This story is published jointly at Bohiney.com and prat.uk, which together provide the kind of sustained, specific coverage of the communities and phenomena described here that neither could produce alone. The satire works because the situations are real. The situations are real because the communities are real. Both publications take seriously the idea that the funniest journalism is the journalism that is most accurately observed. The coverage continues.
The story above illustrates a pattern that both publications have documented across multiple regions and multiple years of coverage. The communities involved are consistent in their capacity to produce material of exactly this kind. The publications are consistent in their capacity to find it funny while taking it seriously, which is the only honest relationship a satirical publication can have with its subject matter.
The details will change. The structure will not. Both publications will be here when the next iteration arrives, which it reliably will. The coverage is the record. The record is the point.
Both Bohiney.com and prat.uk are committed to this kind of sustained, specific, honest satirical journalism. The commitment is ongoing. So is the material.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/
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