ASM-Resilience Escalator Program

Ridge-to-Reef Resilience Escalator in Macabebe, Philippines: Where the Flood Never Truly Leaves

Before sunrise in Barangay Consuelo, the tide is already stirring. The air smells of salt and river mud as 16-year-old Jenalyn helps her father repair a fishing net before she walks to school. Around her, stilt houses glow in the morning light, their bamboo floors already damp. Across the water, Ate Roseanne opens her small sari-sari store, while Kuya Rodolfo tests his patched-up net and whispers a small prayer that today’s catch will be kinder.

Here, the flood is not a disaster. It is a season, an inheritance, and a burden. It shapes memories as much as it shapes the land. Every person in Consuelo grows up learning two calendars: the one with dates, and the one with tides.

Resilience in Consuelo is not a slogan. It is the art of continuing.

A Landscape Between River and Sea

Barangay Consuelo sits where the Pampanga River meets Manila Bay. It is Macabebe’s largest barangay—3,600 hectares of fishponds, tidal flats, mangroves, and thin strips of settlement perched on dikes. Three decades after Mt. Pinatubo erupted, the lahar and sediment it sent downstream continue to shape the barangay’s fate. Riverbeds thickened. Channels narrowed. Drainage slowed. Floods lingered.

Today, the ridge of Pinatubo, the rivers of Pampanga and Tarlac, and the tidal flats of Macabebe form one continuous system. The people living in Consuelo experience every weakness in that system first.

Everyday Burden, Everyday Strength

When rain and tide converge, tricycles stop running. Children skip school. Mothers walk an hour to reach the nearest water pump. The barangay health center opens only one day a week. And every errand—to town, school, pharmacy, or market—costs at least ₱250 (USD4), a painful sum for families who earn barely that much in a day.

Yet life goes on. Clothes are dried above the floodline. Boats double as family shuttles. Families rebuild and repair the dike with their own hands. And in between all this, people hope—not for miracles, but for fairness.

Community Voices

“We cannot stop the flood,” Ate Roseanne says, “but we can protect our children.”

“We don’t want to leave. We want a safer version of our home.” — Fisherfolk elder

“Flooding is not just water. It’s money, time, strength. But we still have dreams.” — Barangay mother

“Science can help us understand what our bodies already know.” — Local youth volunteer

Lifting Local Knowledge Upward, Bringing Science Downward

The Asia Science Mission (ASM) approaches the Mt. Pinatubo region with a core recognition: communities like Barangay Consuelo cannot be understood—or strengthened—in isolation. They are part of a wider socio-ecological system, from ridge to reef, where vulnerabilities and opportunities are deeply interlinked.

ASM positions itself within this landscape in close partnership with Future Earth Philippines which convenes and coordinates a consortium of resource institutions and development actors that includes: (1) the DOST Central Luzon Provincial Science & Technology Offices; (2) the Provincial Governments across the Mt. Pinatubo Region, and (3) the Universities SDG Action Network (USAN), with member universities and colleges across Pampanga and eventually Tarlac, Bulacan, and Zambales. ASM works within this consortium, helping transform its collective energy into a coherent, science-guided system of action.

The ASM-Resilience Escalator organizes this system into four concentric rings: (1) Barangay Consuelo – Ground Zero: the lived reality of risk and adaptation; (2) Municipality of Macabebe – Governance laboratory for flood management, mobility, and community systems; (3) Pampanga Province – Provincial-scale coordination for watershed, river, and coastal zone management; and Mt. Pinatubo Region – Pampanga, Tarlac, Zambales, Bulacan, and Bataan—connected through sediment, hydrology, climate impacts, and livelihoods.

Each ring learns from the one inside it. Each ring uplifts the next bridgework, ensuring lessons from the ground rise upward, and science and resources flow downward—an Escalator of Resilience moving steadily, realistically, and inclusively.

Two Tracks, One Path

ASM-Resilience Escalator advances resilience along two interconnected tracks.

Track One: Strengthen What Already Exists

ASM-Resilience Escalator will support the ongoing work of LGUs, regional agencies, universities, and community organizations. Track One builds on: (a) local government mandates; (b) DRRM and development funds; (c) existing engineering and ecological projects; and (d) LGU-based planning, budgeting, and implementation.

Track One is practical, grounded, and concrete. It recognizes that LGUs hold the resources, authority, and legitimacy to act. Universities and research institutions support this track by providing: (1) systems-level perspectives; (2) tools and methods (GIS, mapping, foresight, hazard analysis); (3) capacity-building for planners, engineers, teachers, and barangay leaders; and (4) technical guidance for integrating science into daily governance. This track moves at the pace of local governance—incrementally but steadily.

Track Two: Co-Design Knowledge for Future Generations

Track two is where ASM’s uniqure value becomes essential. ASM will lead co-designing a research agenda, learning platforms, and adaptive capacity-building systems for the Mt. Pinatubo region. It complements Track One by strengthening the intellectual and scientific foundations of long-term resilience.

ASM-Resilience Escalator envisions long-term, community-rooted knowledge systems that complement local action and strengthen regional resilience. Possible areas of focus include: 1) Co-developing a regional research and learning agenda in partnership with communities, LGUs, and local institutions, 2) Exploring decentralized science platforms across the region, such as labs, monitoring hubs, and learning centers 3) Advancing resilience-focused learning framework that integrates local knowledge with modern scientific approaches 4) Supporting the emergence of a new generation of community scientists—teachers, volunteers, and youth engaged in local research and 5) Documenting lived experiences and generating evidence to inform adaptive strategies over time.

The vision for the Mt. Pinatubo region is one where rivers flow freely and breathe life into surrounding landscapes, where mangroves flourish along the coasts, and fishponds are vibrant and productive. In this region, people move safely through their communities, homes are elevated above the hazards of flooding, and awareness of natural risks is second nature to everyone. Most importantly, every child, like Jenalyn, can dream of a future shaped by hope and opportunity, not constrained by the rising tide.

ASM efforts aim to foster inclusive, locally relevant, and science-informed pathways for long-term resilience, while remaining flexible to evolving priorities and opportunities.

Why It Matters Beyond Macabebe

Consuelo is a small community—but through it, the challenges and hopes of the entire Pinatubo river system come into view: (1) subsidence; (2) sedimentation; (3) upstream-downstream inequities; (4) coastal vulnerability; (5) migration pressures; (6) governance gaps; and (7) climate extremes.

The ASM-Resilience Escalator is a model for region-wide, science-guided, community-rooted resilience—not a quick fix, but a generational project.

A Call From the Water

In Purulia, resilience begins with soil. In Consuelo, it begins with tides. Both remind us that resilience is a dialogue—between science and memory, between land and people, between what is and what might still be possible. The Mt. Pinatubo Region Resilience Escalator Strategy is that dialogue made visible.

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