The Market Monitor Minding the Nation's Business
San Miguel Corporation (SMC) marked five years of cleaning up major rivers and 10 key waterways in Metro Manila and surrounding provinces — removing a total of 8.5 million metric tons of silt and solid waste as of end of June 2025
Project Better Rivers PH was launched in 2020, with the goal of reducing river pollution and help minimize flooding by dredging rivers and improving their flow.
According to SMC Chairman and CEO Ramon S. Ang, the company has already cleared over 161 kilometers of river channels but the work is far from over.
The waste and silt — removed from the Tullahan, Pasig and San Juan Rivers; rivers in Bulacan and Pampanga; the San Isidro, Biñan, and Tunasan Rivers in Laguna, and waterways in Navotas and Parañaque — were found to significantly increase the carrying capacity of these waterway systems.
“The project helped lessen the risk of severe flooding in surrounding communities, by enabling floodwaters to be drained to Manila Bay more effectively. Without this intervention, many of these waterways, made shallow by years of silt and debris buildup, would frequently overflow and inundate communities,” Ang said.
The effort also reduced foul odors from rivers and, in some cases, encouraged the return of fish, owing to the removal of decomposing waste and garbage from river beds.
“Because of many contributing and aggravating factors, flooding continues to be a major risk for many of our cities and provinces. For San Miguel, we cannot afford to just stand by and do nothing because in the end, our economy, and all of us, suffer. That’s why we’ve been working non-stop these last five years to help clean and restore our rivers,” Ang said.
“Through cooperation with the national and local governments and other stakeholders, we’ve now managed to increase the carrying capacities of our major rivers. But a lot still needs to be done, including in changing mindsets and discouraging the throwing of wastes in our waterways. We are committed to continue working with stakeholders and doing our part every way we can,” he added.
SMC’s river cleanup initiative, implemented year-round, is part of its broader social responsibility agenda, and is aligned with SMC’s major sustainability initiatives, which includes a drive towards addressing critical water issues.
Fully-funded and undertaken by SMC, the program comes at no cost to government and taxpayers, and is done in close coordination with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources and local government units.
From early efforts to clean up the Tullahan, Pasig and San Juan Rivers, SMC’s river cleanup extended northwards to Bulacan and Pampanga, and south to rivers in Paranaque and Laguna.
Last June, it completed the cleanup of Tunasan River in Laguna, where it removed 53,774 tons of silt and wastes.
This is on top of earlier efforts to clean up the Binan River (87,899 tons removed) and San Isidro River in San Pedro (417,044 tons removed). The company is set start cleaning up two more rivers in the province.