Apo Island

How did Apo Island fishermen create a community sanctuary in 1982?

In the early 1980s, Angel Alcala, of the Silliman University marine laboratory in Dumaguete, spent three years persuading Apo's fishermen to close part of their reef. In 1982, together they chose 450 m of shoreline, extending 500 m offshore, and banned fishing there: it is the second oldest marine sanctuary in the country. A marine management committee looks after the reserve; the biomass of large predators there has increased eightfold. The model caught on: hundreds of Philippine community sanctuaries descend from it. In 1994, Proclamation 438 declared the island and its waters a 691-hectare protected landscape under the NIPAS law, with a management board. In 2003, Chicago's Shedd Aquarium built its Wild Reef exhibit on Apo; in 2008, Sport Diver magazine named it among the world's hundred best dive sites.

In December 2011 and December 2012, typhoons Sendong and Pablo flattened nearly 99% of the reefs in the sanctuary zone, on the southeast coast; the northern reefs were spared. The sanctuary has been closed ever since, and diving takes place on the island's other coasts.

What are the dive sites around Apo Island, point by point?

Coconut Point, in the north, is the benchmark drift: a slope of soft corals, barrel sponges and table corals, where the current pushes schools of trevally, fusiliers, barracuda and unicornfish, with banded sea kraits on the bottom; a sandy hollow between two walls lets you get out when the washing machine goes wild. Mamsa Point, next door, is the meeting place of trevally and eagle rays, sometimes too strong for anyone. Chapel starts from a shallow coral and sand bank, then the wall, pocked with overhangs and small caverns, drops to around 30 m: black and white snappers, dogtooth tuna, bumphead parrotfish, leaf scorpionfish. Rock Point and Rock Point West, in the south, have the finest hard corals, pyramid butterflyfish, redtooth triggerfish, frogfish and cuttlefish. Largahan is the dark volcanic sand slope, with its gas bubbles and its macro. Katipanan, a gentle slope down to 18 m, is used for refresher dives; Cogon Point, in the east, is the fallback in strong current, with pygmy seahorses below 20 m and turtles under the overhangs.

How much does diving Apo Island cost, and why might it change?

Divers pay PHP 300 a day, 100 to enter the island and 200 for the day of diving, collected by the dive centers and passed on to the island; swimmers and those who come to see the turtles from the surface pay their own fees, set by the management board. This fee schedule is under review. The 2016 national order of the environment ministry sets a minimum of PHP 800 for Filipinos and PHP 1,800 for foreigners in protected areas; on May 20, 2026, the Negros Oriental chamber of commerce asked for these fees to be lowered, and nothing had changed at Apo as of that date. Expect a possible increase. Since 2019, a management board resolution, based on a Silliman University carrying capacity study, has capped the number of divers and swimmers per site and per day, with ticketing and booking: that's why dive centers leave at fixed times and ask you to sign up the day before. Fees are often paid in cash.