The story
Pawikan Festival in Morong
Morong, Bataan hosts a month-long Pawikan Festival every November at the Pawikan Conservation Center, dedicated to marine turtle protection, where the highlight event is the morning release of turtle hatchlings by a center staffed with reformed former poachers. Staff at the conservation center include people who used to poach turtle eggs and now protect the same nests.
Along the coastline of Barangay Nagbalayong in Morong, Bataan, the Pawikan Conservation Center protects one of the most active marine turtle nesting sites in the Philippines, home to endangered Olive Ridley sea turtles that return to these original nesting grounds each year between September and January to lay their eggs.