Maricel Vasquez, fondly remembers a time in her youth when the Tandag River, situated along the northeastern coast of Mindanao, ran generous and full. Its waters abundantly teeming with fish and shells that locals eat, bathed freely along its banks, washed clothes, children played, and families relied on the river’s bounty for food and water.

“It is where we got our food and drinking water. It was clean—there were fish and shells. That's where we would take baths and wash our clothes,” she said.

For much of Maricel’s life, locals of Tandag City, the capital of Surigao del Sur province, watched as the river that once sustained life turned to polluted waters.

“The fish died, the shells were no longer edible, and even bathing wasn’t possible anymore,” she added.

As adults tell stories of the river’s generous past, young ones only know caution, warned against bathing or consuming anything it yields. Household wastes, garbage from businesses, and poor drainage systems flowed into its waters, spreading disease, fouling the current, and choking a river once regarded as the city’s lifeline.

When the river is polluted, the ocean bears the consequence. What begins inland ends up in the sea, where polluted runoff and waste degrade marine life along Tandag’s coast.

What once seemed beyond saving began to bend toward the river’s renewal when the city realized the fight had to divert waste at the source: inside households, in daily habits, in the smallest actions about waste.  

And when it came to leading this change, the city turned to its women—women like Maricel. Mothers juggling households, grandmothers caring for their grandchildren, working women—shopkeepers, vendors, service workers, lending their time and commitment cleaning at the coast and riverbanks, without fee or merit.

As an initiative by the local government to save the city’s lifeline, they established the Motherly Association for River Initiatives Towards Environmental Sustainability, or MARITES where the women have since emerged as the river’s stewards, caring and protecting it with the same hands that raised their families and communities.

Tandag City, a third class city facing the Philippine Sea, is composed of 21 barangays, six of which are urban and coastal, serving as areas for trade and tourism. It is defined by abundant water bodies, rivers, creeks, and springs that sustain mangroves, biodiversity, agriculture, and fisheries while also helping manage flood risks in low-lying areas.

The strong connection to the water is most visible in the Tandag River which traverses the city, the people’s defining lifeline.

From its headwaters in neighboring Lanuza municipality, Tandag River snakes through more than 80 kilometers, weaving past upland sitios like Ibuan and Mampi before flowing through the lowland barangays in Pandanon, San Isidro, Quezon, Bioto, Telaje, Dagocdoc, and Bongtud and finally draining into the Philippine Sea through Tandag City’s 24-kilometer coastline.

For centuries, the river has been an important lifeline for the region, as it is also home to the indigenous communities of Mamanwa and Manobo, who built their early settlements along its banks and drew food, water, and life from its bountiful flow. 

Despite being endowed with tributaries that thread through forests, sustain farmlands, and villages before emptying to the sea, this abundance is its own consequence.

“Geographically, Tandag City is surrounded by land and coast, and it is traversed by the Tandag River with its tributaries. In other words, Tandag City is surrounded by bodies of water,” said Edwin Ajos, City Environment Resources Officer of Tandag.

Hemmed in by coast and river,  the city has no more land to spare for waste disposal. Its only sanitary landfill is already straining under the weight of plastic waste as it nears its capacity.

^{Tandag’s sanitary landfill located at the city’s Eco Park in Barangay San Jose.}

“We do not have the luxury of area to allocate for another sanitary landfill. In fact, our present sanitary landfill is in deplorable condition, although the operational lifetime of sanitary landfill is about 10 years, but with this rate of disposal, I guess it will be less than five years. We will run out of areas where we can dispose,” he said.

^{Waste workers sort plastics at the city’s Residual Containment Area.}

Without a proper facility to treat plastic, plastic waste is temporarily stored in the Residual Containment Area (RCA), with only select recyclables such as PET bottles sold off.

Other types of plastic remain in limbo, stuck in the city’s sanitary landfill (SLF), while awaiting the construction of a dedicated  recycling facility, thereby increasing the risk of leakage into the ocean. 

^{Sorted plastics are placed into sacks.}

For residents along coastal areas like Maricel, the problem hits close to home: more people, cramped communities.

“When the population increased and more houses surged, that’s when it became a problem. The river became dirty,” she said.

At the mouth of the river, hundreds of families live in houses on stilts, their wooden posts driven into the shallow waters. These settlements perch steadily above the murky waters, where families cook, wash clothes, fetch water to tend to their daily needs, all while living atop the waters that bear the burden of the household waste they discard.

^{Houses stand on wooden stilts above muddied waters in Barangay Mabua, situated near the river.
Photo courtesy of MARITES-Mabua}

“Back then, people just threw their waste into the river,” Maricel recalled. “There were no proper facilities, some households had no proper toilets and people thought it was fine.”

“The people did not care. They did not care that their actions had consequences,” she added.  

And the cost of this indifference found them in full force. The river, once generous, soon turned unsafe.

“There was a time when there was a spread of waterborne disease, a bad sickness, because of the waste in the river. It was a serious disease. That's why at that time, we were prohibited from going into the water,” Augustin Suazo said, an official of Barangay Dagocdoc.

The problem is bigger than one barangay. Residents in communities like Barangay Dagocdoc watched as plastics from surrounding neighborhoods funnel through canals into their stretch of the river. Communities at the river’s mouth serve as the final outflow, turning what should be a local challenge into a transboundary headache.

“The garbage comes from the upland barangays. We can see the waste from the upland communities flowing down,” Barangay Dagocdoc official Roland Villamor said.

For the CENRO, tackling the problem means working on two ends: scaling up plastic waste diversion through repurposing, and on the other end, is positioning a community based organization like MARITES as a bridge between households and local government, with women driving the city’s waste management efforts.

Under Component 2 of the MOF/PEMSEA ODA Project on Reducing Marine Plastics in the East Asian Seas Region, a pilot project on Boosting Plastic Waste Diversion through Innovative Product Repurposing aims to establish and operate a dedicated plastic waste processing facility to reduce ocean-bound plastics (OBP) and improve the city’s waste diversion rate.

The facility will convert residual plastics into valuable products, while enhancing the capacity of the local government to manage plastic waste sustainably. The project also aims to divert plastic waste from the sanitary landfill, extending its lifespan through active partnerships with coastal communities.

Under the Marine Environment Protectors (MEP) program of the Marine Plastics ODA Project, the MARITES has become a partner in realizing these hopes of the local government.

“The role of the MARITES is to prevent plastics from going to the ocean, which would otherwise increase the volume of waste being dumped in the sanitary landfill,” said Ajos.

“It's about promoting women's empowerment and leadership in environmental initiatives. . That's very unique and they have potential. And I guess that's the power that they have - to be women, partnering with agencies for environmental protection,” he added.

These initiatives aim to cut the problem at its source across six central barangays along the Tandag River, areas that contribute an estimated 80 to 90 percent of the city’s OBPs.

With the Marine Plastics ODA Project’s support, the group has mobilized community-based efforts leading information, education, and communication campaigns with residents, families, and  the youth, turning plastic waste into ecobricks, plant pots, and other useful materials, all while raising awareness through hands-on segregation activities.

From a simple push by the CENRO with support by the Marine Plastics ODA Project, the group has transformed into a movement, the women of Tandag call their own.

In the Philippines, Marites has become the cultural shorthand for someone who thrives in community gossip. While a familiar and sometimes humorous social staple, they symbolize a person with a penchant for their neighbors’ affairs, often turning curiosity into disruptive intrusion.

But in Tandag City, being a MARITES is worn with a badge of honor.  

For the women of MARITES, the work starts before sunrise. Clad in matching uniforms, brooms in hand and garbage bags in tow, the women head to the city’s river and shores for another day of sweeping, sorting, and collecting waste from their city’s precious lifelines.

As morning breaks over the city, the women wade through heaps of discarded plastic along the river and coast. Lifting tangled scraps enmeshed with debris, collecting floating wrappers, diapers, food waste, and bottles from the water, plucking discarded sachets and styrofoam.

As the city stirs back to life, the women pack, heave, and weigh their collected wastes sack after sack, filled with plastics that once threatened to choke Tandag’s waters.

It was not a smooth beginning for MARITES. Like many new community based organizations, it faced birthing pains—membership was difficult to build, especially with its work resting purely on volunteer effort.

For mothers like Maricel, who juggles motherhood and volunteering, the challenge was even more personal. Before, she used to stay at home, caring for her children, managing the household, and supporting her husband, all while devoting time to cleaning the river.

At first, her husband disagreed, not understanding why she was leaving the house for volunteer work.

“My husband was really against it because of the time commitment. He did not understand the need to travel for MARITES and leave the kids behind,” she said.

For Maricel, the real gain in MARITES was never money, it was growth. She pushed on, while unpaid, for the chance to sharpen her skills and discover abilities to lead they never knew they had, “But when I explained to him what MARITES was doing for the environment, he no longer had a problem with it,” she said.

“The biggest impact for me is the development of my skills and our perspective on life. We persevere not for a salary, because there is none, but because we are able to learn things we didn't know before.”
“I used to think it was just about cleaning, but now, for me it's a huge responsibility to the environment,” she added, realizing that the work in MARITES goes beyond cleanups and demands a deeper commitment to the environment.
Now, apart from housework and volunteering, Maricel juggles two other important things: working mother and a community leader, heading the MARITES group in Barangay Mabua.
In its early days, the MARITES also carried the sting of public doubt, mocked by bemused residents who had yet to see the value of their efforts.

“Initially, we were laughed at by the community. Because of our name, they thought we were just gossiping,” said Alma Obod who leads MARITES in Barangay Dagocdoc.

The MARITES are no strangers to their city’s plastic problem. They began as volunteers under the city’s River Care Program (RCP), an early initiative by the local government to reduce waste in the Tandag River. Through the RCP, the city witnessed how women shouldered the river’s care as steadily as they managed their own households.

This led the CENRO to mobilize the women across the six baranggays: Bongtud, Dagocdoc, San Agustin Sur, Telaje, Bag-ong Lungsod, and Mabua to help sustain the river.

When MARITES formed, membership was thin, few were willing to work without pay, and most residents were still unaware of how quickly the plastic problem was worsening.

But those initial speedbumps became the very inspiration that propelled the women of MARITES to persevere in their work, driving new initiatives that put plastic awareness at the center of community life.

“We just continued our efforts, and because of that, the community saw how crucial it is to clean the river. Before, diapers, plastic wrappers, and bottles were floating on the river. When the community and local government agencies, barangay officials saw what we were doing, they started helping us with the cleanup,” said Alma. 

As mothers, the women of MARITES know that the first step to change is close to home, so they start with their children.

“Because of what I'm doing in MARITES, my children have also been influenced. At home, my kids are now the ones who segregate our trash,” Maricel said, taking pride in her family’s role in supporting the MARITES mission for a cleaner environment.

As a community leader, Alma organized the youth in her neighborhood and spoke to them about the importance of proper waste disposal.

“I told the students in the community that when they're at school and they eat, they should just take their garbage home with them and not throw it anywhere.”

And so they did. Barangay officials were the firsthand witnesses to these changes, as they see the youth being more aware of their actions on waste segregation.

Now, the community sees the change.  Things were not easy before the MARITES, barangay officials recalled. According to Villamor, when communities suffered from waterborne diseases, it was the MARITES who helped contain the crisis through persistent clean ups.

“Before, it was difficult to gather people for cleanups in our barangay. Now that we’ve partnered with MARITES, we can mobilize many more volunteers. They have been a huge help, especially their leadership,” said Villamor. 
Today, cleanups have become a Saturday routine. Encouraged by the MARITES, residents bring at least one person from every household to join the clean ups, reaching a once-unthinkable feat of participation from a formerly disengaged community.
For the CENRO, the long-term goal is sustainability. “As the group grows, we hope they can stand on their own, even without the support of government agencies. Beyond this project, we want to keep exploring other opportunities with PEMSEA,” Ajos said.
Plans are already taking shape. According to the CENRO, a proposed MARITES center aims to serve as a hub for advocacy and action for the community, while the introduction of kayaks will help the volunteers collect garbage along the river and, at the same time, open up livelihood opportunities through river and coastal tourism.

Volunteering without compensation is already a demanding commitment. Without financial security and fixed salaries, sustaining for the long-term is a question for the future.

The CENRO hopes that MARITES attains stability, “We need them to continue,” Ajos said, “Through exploring further partnerships and opportunities with the Marine Plastics ODA Project.”

Balancing work, motherhood, and household responsibilities should have been enough for the MARITES volunteers, but for them, advocating for the environment is a cause to leave to the future generation.

For Maricel, it was about turning her lived experiences into lessons for her children, making sure that the next generation would inherit the knowledge and resolve to protect what remained.

“Today, we can no longer eat the fish here anymore and are unsure if the ocean is clean. As a MARITES member, I want to share my experiences and knowledge about the environment to my children, so they could also pass it to their own children,” she said.

The sea’s harvest may rise from the nets of men, but women turn the flow into something more enduring. Along its banks, mothers bathe their children, wash clothes, draw from its waters to cook meals and nourish their families. In this quiet yet unyielding labor, women sustain life with the flow of the river, carrying the lifeline of the community.

And for the women of MARITES, a clean river and ocean is a promise of life.

Words and Photos
by Klyra Orbien

About the Project

The “Reducing Marine Plastics in the East Asian Seas Region” or the Marine Plastics Project is a six-year initiative between PEMSEA and the Republic of Korea through the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries. It aims to reduce marine plastics in 10 local sites, six in the Philippines and four sites in Timor-Leste through improved governance and management, demonstration of best practices and innovative solutions, marine litter monitoring, and increasing capacity and awareness of the partner communities. 

The Project targets ocean-bound plastics: within 50-kilometer from the shoreline, river inflow, and fishing-related plastics. In the Philippines, the Marine Plastic Project is being implemented in collaboration with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources-Environmental Management Bureau and the Foreign Assisted and Special Projects Services, while in Timor-Leste, it is being implemented with the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Forestry, Ministry of Tourism and Environment, and Ministry of State Administration. 

For more information about the project, visit the Marine Plastics Project site.

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