Caril became interested in the islands of northern Palawan during a solo bangka voyage in 1977.

An American commissioner of parks and recreation, regional community planner and president for business and recreational organizations in Washington State Caril Ridley is best known for helping a thousand otherwise homeless people re-build their lives. As community planner, psychologist and cultural anthropologist she has traveled across fifty countries designing communities with an eye on the future and believes there is no place on earth more beautiful than Palawan, no place with more potential for eco tourism but few places with greater social, cultural and environmental issues needing to be addressed.

Caril’s PEMS program is designed to draw international attention to Palawan’s environmental and social concerns while presenting alternatives to the countries of Asia, Europe, Africa and the Americas. She says “PEMS location in Palawan as a corporate conferencing destination and environmental education center will attract attention to issues threw-out the world, drawing national and international resources to help preserve pristine wilderness and more importantly reflect the environmental needs of a growing Asia“. She recognizes East Asian Economic Groups are beginning to pool resources and understands their need to find a central location for conferencing as they address the important issues of broader Asia. She says locating an eco-economic conferencing center among some of the most beautiful islands in the world will be like attracting bees to honey and the nature of Palawan’s environmental delicacy will follow them home to influence growth, local management and regional environmental policy.

For most people Caril Ridley is the visionary, a successful business and planning leader, for many she is the person who made history in India and then again in Peru, for others she is the Olympic trained kayaker, athlete and author but for her family and the people who know her best she is the one who cares so deeply and helps so many with a passion for creating, and making things right.

Caril is also known for building urban and wilderness trails. In her words “Trails serve to connect people with each other, with their communities, with their primal natures and with their natural environments” Caril builds trails more than metaphors, she builds trails that people can follow.

Bernard Kemp
PEMS Co-founder

Bernard has lived in Northern Palawan for five years studying regional cultures, teaching Natural History, writing and guiding kayaking, scuba diving and leading island hopping adventures throughout Palawan’s northern archipelago. An accomplished international traveler Bernard has experienced many of the more remote destinations of Asia, often from luxury-yachts but recently from traditional hand carved, out-triggered bancas. He says “This is were I want to be” believing that when you get close to the natural environment you get in touch with yourself, with the universe and its creator.

South African by birth Bernards heritage echoes his Philippine grandmothers migration to Cape Town early in the last century and that linkage offered his destiny to return as an environmentalist addressing the needs of Palawan at an important time in history.

His education, training, world experience, extensive seamanship and passion for nature offers tourists an opportunities to understand the nature of this pristine and remote wilderness and by their understanding offers an opportunity to share his vision, to help and to make a difference. Bernard says “I’ve developed a very personal… an insatiably need to give back to the Earth by recognizing the world as an extension of myself and an extension of every person. Our voyage of understanding is, at its best, a journey to share.”

Working with other likeminded environmentalists Bernard began addressing the needs of Northern Palawan by giving birth to the concept of eco-repair tourism. Through his experience and growing awareness Bernard recognized that many aquatic habitats were being degraded at an alarming rate, and that without attention damage could become irreversible. The question for him became “What can we do to reverse this trend?”. Since that time Bernard has become the first Philippines advisor/representative for the Global Coral Reef Alliance Global Coral Reef Alliance Advis studying and developing techniques for reef repair, networking and educating local residents.

In the fall of 2005, on one of the more remote islands, he met Caril Ridley a cultural anthropologist and American philanthropist in search of the perfect island. She was also looking to help the indigenous tribes of Palawan and proved to be the powerhouse in developing the desperately needed Environmental and Marine Studies Center known as PEMS.

Palawan Eco-Adventures are created to support projects and programs designed to stay destruction of habitats, protect and preserve endangered and endemic species and help struggling borangay (villages) learn skills that will nurture a more progressive and sustainable environment.

Erano “Rannie” Dulay
PEMS Charter Member
New Era Aquaventure Founder
Reefs and Rainforest Conservationist

Rannie Dulay, a former mariner by profession, working with "Lagoon Explorer" in 1993-95 a Catamaran luxury boat, cruising around the Calamianes group of Islands up to El Nido in Palawan, where he earned his rank as quarter master, and with 4 years work experience with one of the world's most highly awarded eco-tourism company, trained as sea kayaking lead guide and managing its Philippine operation in January 2000.

Left with unfinished environmental conservation project and community eco-management and empowerment program, he decided to start his own "adventure tours" with the aim to continue the conservation project and program, by generating a sustainable source of income to support the project and program that was started, by promoting a high quality standards recreational adventure tours, in cooperation with "Calamian Island Tours Association", Discovery Divers, Tagbanua Foundation of Coron Island and John Gray Sea Canoe. Hopefully anybody can experience the magical and absolute nature adventures, in the Philippines' last frontiers, a living laboratory and the epi-center of biodiversity.

A Member of PCGA 404.1 Rannie Dulay became deputized forest officer in 1988 and with his interest in fisheries, and environmental preservation became fish Warden. He arrived in Coron, Northern Palawan working aboard a catamaran yacht in 1993.

As an environmentalist and as a member of Sea Canoe, an award winning back to nature sea kayaking organization, Rannie guided groups thorough out the Calamean. He has training and vast experience with natural history, geology, seamanship, regional community leadership as well as a refined understanding of flora and fauna. In the late nineteen-nineties he organized, founded and became president of the Calamian Island Tours Association (CITA) and began organizing local boat captains and owners into Sea Kayaking Expeditions, and has been managed a sPhilippine Sea Canoeing operation.

Ronnie was featured in National Geographic Magazine (July 2002 issue) as Wilderness Guide and Environmentalist and his relation building with the Tagbanua tribes of Coron Island has offered unprecedented access to otherwise restricted tribal lands. His skilled negotiations with tribal leaders offers resources to aboriginal peoples in the form of a Fish Culture operation and most recently a hatchery project which he owns and presently manages.

With his vision; to help, to preserve and protect historical and cultural values, with his contributions to regional environmental interest in creating sustainable natural resources, with his effectiveness in management and his work with indigenous tribes Rannie offers PEMS extensive regional connections and tribal insight into environmental and regional needs. Thru the REACTIONS concept of Reefs to Rainforest conservation and to ensure Food and Water security, Rannie spreads environmental awareness, offers community leadership and training, He is passionate about environmental rights and the Rule of Law, in his words “We need a law applied to all”. is efforts with PEMS ensures that each community manages their own natural resources in a sustainable way and for the future generation.

Bienvenido (Benny) Luciano Edrosa
Analyst and Technologist
PEMS Charter Member

Benny is a retired technologist born in the Philippines. He studied and lived in the United States for 20 years before returning to the purity and simplicity of his homeland. During his stay in the US he worked at perfecting the plastic industry and then became an environmentalist volunteering his time working with DENR PAWS in Palawan. There he found that paradise truly does exist and recognized the contrast between his new life living naturally and the city life in LA. With his return to nature he asked the question “What balance is there between human habitat and natures wonderland and what is our role in preserving paradise? He believes there is a discipline required if humanity wants to maintain a pristine-state for future generations and he punctuates his points by asserting “This is Palawan, the worlds Gelapagos” challenging us to understand what that means.

Son of the founder of DuraCoat Paints Benny was fortunate to be educated at an exclusive school, Don Bosco Technical School in Mandaluyong. One of his passions is music, the amplification and sanitization of sound and he went on to study the dynamics of sounds and vibration, graduated electronics at Guzman Tech at age of sixteen. He helped with the family business (Suburban Lanes) while studying at Mapua Institute of Technology EE.

After his family migrated to the United State in the early Eighties searching for better opportunities he worked for manufacturing companies as an injection molding technician. This industry was at its infancy and making use of his technological skill he became involved with state of the art process controllers and robotics as a Beta tester. With the advent of the computer age he becomes a System Analyst, Network Specialist, Software Creator and Programmer and has learned how to employ these skills as an environmentalist who believes that Eco Tourism is an answer to many of the worlds challenges and that we can show humanity a way to preserve nature through awareness, education, using pools of resources and employing technology.

Willy A. Jereza
PEMS Charter Member
Founding Chairman of Environmental Studies for Global Progress Assn. Inc.
Solid Waste Technologies, Designer, Contractor and Consultant

A graduate of Business Management with a Masters in Business Administration Willy’s experience with commerce and long career as an engaged environmentalist is just beginning. His work with PEMS for the preservation of Palawan and the betterment of humanity brings a wide range of skills, including; technological designs for processing solid waste, in-depth understanding of science, biology, chemistry, engineering and precision machinery. Willy’s passion is simple, he wants “To help protect the environment for the people of the World…”

In the early nineties Willy organized “GREENPOWER” an NGO creating permanent growth seedlings for distribution at cost for private and public re-forestation. He was also part of “Earth Matters” sponsored by DENR of the Philippines and the United Nations.

Willy’s success as an environmental speaker has propelled him to lecture at schools, universities and civic organizations around the Philippines and his proficiency with environmental science as well as his ability to present important western water technologies has made him a sought after radio talk show resource.

Willy has published one-hundred-twenty articles with headings such as “Global Warming: A Phenomenon with many faces” and “Beyond the Limits of Earth” His journalism contributes ongoing to public awareness. His will and enthusiasm to the betterment of humanity and his efforts to Palawan.