The Lowly Balinghoy's Dire Implications

With the way things seem to be shaping up in Negros, there is more to the cassava - the lowly "balinghoy" - than meets the eye. The corporate scheme and the politics being played by the RPA are heating up the long-simmering social volcano that the generations-old sugar industry has brought. It won’t be long before Cojuangco and others like him will be enmeshed in a peasant unrest that could turn radical overnight.

By KARL G. OMBION and JAIME L. ESPINA
Cobra-Ans/Bulatlat.com

Bacolod City - Militant groups in Negros Occidental have long warned against the plan of their arch-nemesis, Eduardo Cojuangco Jr., to set up sprawling cassava and corn plantations all over the province in the guise of "farmers' cooperatives." The goal is to provide raw materials for San Miguel Corporation, the food and beverage giant the former Marcos and Estrada crony owns. 

Cojuangco’s corporate plan has come into fruition, for instance, through the Salvador Benedicto Cassava, Corn and Coffee Planters' Multi-Purpose Cooperative  (Salvaccopa), set up by former Salvador Benedicto mayor and close Cojuangco henchman Nehemias dela Cruz on the same mountain town. Similar cooperatives have been set up by Dela Cruz in barangay Pingot, Ilog, this time under the guise of  a Community-Based Forestry Management Agreement (CBFMA) approved by then Environment Secretary Antonio Cerilles.

Recent reports from southern Negros also show that Salvaccopa has expanded in the area and that cassava plantations are also being set up in other Ilog villages particularly in Candoni, Cauayan.

Leaders of the southern Negros peasant alliance MAPISAN say that, in the CHICKS area alone, at least 100,000 hectares have been targeted for cassava and corn production.

In the north, meanwhile, the plantation in Don Salvador Benedicto will be enlarged from 600 hectares to some 5,000 hectares in the hinterlands of the town, and in Calatrava, Murcia and the cities of Escalante, San Carlos, and Bago.

Proof, say the militants, of Cojuangco's land expansion using Dela Cruz's "cooperatives" are what Stephen Peduano, Revolutionary Proletarian Army (RPA) national commander, does not hesitate to admit that Cojuangco's "cooperatives" are a cover for the latter’s vast agri-business empire of more than 4,000 hectares in Central Negros.

Consequently, hinterland peasant communities have come out against the plantations which they say can only lead to their mass displacement.

It is not just the peasants who worry about this possibility, however. Progressive quarters of the local Catholic Church have also raised the alarm about the trend of "land reconcentration" in the displacement of farming communities.

‘Dummies’

Errol Gatumbato, superintendent of the Mt. Kanla-on National Park, acknowledges this threat. "I have unverified reports that some of our CBFMAs (Community-Based Forest Management Agreement) awards went to people's organizations identified to be working with, or dummies of, Nene dela Cruz and (Cojuangco)," he said.

The CBFMA awardees, Gatumbato adds, avail of credit facilities of the Land Bank of the Philippines, the government institution that also provides credit to Salvaccopa and its members.

"CBFMA per se is good," Gatumbato says. "The question, however, is we are not totally sure whether this goes to and benefits our poor people, or is being used by big agri-business corporations."

Recently, Agrarian Reform Secretary Hernani Braganza commissioned a study on the implications of large-scale cassava production. "The areas being identified...,” his office said, “comprise the lands distributed (or to be distributed) prospective and qualified agrarian reform beneficiaries by the DAR."

The study, prepared by researchers from the Department of Agronomy, College of Agriculture, University of the Philippines in Los Baños, Laguna does touch on the implications of cassava plantations on agrarian reform. But it also unearths other heretofore unseen dangers and threats of large-scale cassava production not just against farmers but the province's populace and, indeed, the very earth as well.

Alcohol production

First, the U.P. study notes that while the emerging cassava plantations are invariably passed off as "farmer-initiated" cooperatives, it makes no bones about the fact that the trend is, in fact, "industry-led initiatives to utilize cassava foodstock for alcohol production in the province of Negros Occidental."

"The plan to use cassava," it notes, "is due to the unstable declining trend in the supply of molasses which, in turn is due to the decreasing sugarcane production in the country."

This revelation indicates a shifting dynamic not only in the patterns of land ownership but in Negros' feudalistic power structure itself as well.

While political power in the province has traditionally shifted around rival cliques in the sugar-producing elite, the hundreds of thousands of hectares that would be amassed for the production of cassava and other crops appear to be a monolithic project. This will place a vast portion of the province, far larger than any single power bloc may claim to own, under the control of a single individual. 

This scenario has taken shape given the results of the May 11, 2001 elections, when the United Negros Alliance (UNA), the local party linked to Cojuangco, pulled off an almost clean sweep of all local positions, from governor down to the municipal mayors. UNA succeeded in dividing the local Lakas-NUCD at a time when the party was supposed to be ascendant with the ouster of Joseph Estrada from the presidency.

Relatedly, Gov. Joseph Marañon recently said that he found the idea of making his province a production base for raw materials to be sold to SMC attractive.  In fact, he said, this thrust was a vital component of his program for "food self-sufficiency."

Worth watching too is that the Nationalist People's Coalition (NPC), which Cojuangco heads, is consolidating itself for the 2004 elections amid signs that everything is not all well between President Arroyo and the party which she heads. Arroyo has been lambasted for granting the powerful industrialist too many concessions. 

Expensive

Meanwhile, the U.P. study reveals that cassava "is expensive to grow (P0.60 to P1.20/kg roots) and the net profit margin for farmers is low at P0.80 to P1/kg farm gate price of cassava."

"As a feedstock for alcohol, it is 2.5 times more expensive than molasses," the study continues. For one, large-scale cassava farming, "in otherwise under utilized (patch cultivation, seasonal crop) and less favorable agro-environment for agricultural production" can mean a "minimum of 66 days…This translates to 19,800 days of work in a 300-hectare village growing cassava."

Capital infusion is also large. The study estimates an infusion of between P4.5 to P5.4 million for every 300 hectares planted through production loans of around P15,000 per hectare for exclusive cassava farming and P18,000 per hectare for a corn and cassava relay.

The handling and preparation of cassava relies on fuel-based machinery, hence, the costs "will also increase as the price of oil increases," the study also points out.

Environmental costs

The study also warns that the environmental costs of (cassava's) large-scale production can undercut the economic benefits. Because cassava is "a nutrient scavenger crop," its large-scale production will mean "rapid soil fertility."  Thus, "large amount of nutrients should be continuously added to avoid excessive nutrient depletion and significant yield at decline over time."

This makes large-scale cassava production expensive since "nitrogen is about 50 percent of the fertilizer budget and 16 percent of the total cost of production (excluding harvesting and hauling)."

More serious is "massive soil erosion, "estimated at between 100 to 200 tons of soil per hectare in the hilly, sloping areas most suited to cassava farming, which, in turn, "can cause topsoil depletion."

This can lead to flashfloods downstream, shortage of fresh water supply for irrigation and domestic use and higher cost of fertilizer to compensate for the depleted topsoil.

Estimating the worth of lost topsoil at P150 per ton, the study says the cost of depletion "could offset the gross value of cassava produced."

Possibly the most serious threat posed by the establishment of vast cassava plantations is that these will compete with areas devoted to food security crops such as rice and corn.

With more than half the province's agricultural land devoted to sugarcane, Negros Occidental has perennially been able to produce, on the average, only half of its rice and corn requirements. The only time in recent history that the province has achieved self-sufficiency in these two staples was during the sugar crisis of the mid-1980s, when sugarcane plantations were abandoned and jobless farm laborers planted sustenance crops.

If the estimate of MAPISAN about the planned scale of the cassava plantations in southern Negros is accurate, that would mean the loss of a vast area for sustenance farming.

‘Policy imperatives’

Despite the costs and dangers of large-scale cassava production as a feedstock for alcohol production, the U.P. study believes that through two "major policy imperatives" the agro-industry could yet be made profitable for “both industrialists-investors and farmers.” The policy imperatives are the adoption of environmental protection and conservation efforts and the adoption of equitable pro-farmer and profitable cassava-based farming system.

Given the realities on the ground, these twin measures are easier said than done. For example, the study suggests the promotion of a "flexible and competitive cassava-pricing scheme that will assure farmers favorable net profit margin."

The rationale behind this is that farmers will continue to plant cassava (only) “if they realized an acceptable profit margin." Thus, "parity pricing of cassava should not only consider the feedstock sourcing for alcohol as in molasses or the importation of cassava (from) elsewhere (i.e., Thailand)," but also the local cost of production and other crops the farmers may grow.

"The dictum that, 'Let free-market (forces) govern the price of a commodity' may not be applied" the study stresses, since "the farmers have the option to grow other crops," thereby defeating the whole purpose of the enterprise.

No choice

However, as the production agreement between Salvaccopa and its members shows, the farmers are not likely to have any choice in either the pricing of their cassava or growing other crops if they find the price unacceptable.

The agreement binds the farmer to "sell, transfer and convey to the cooperative all raw corn and cassava produce of his/her enrolled farm at the price set under the (production management agreement) executed between the cooperative and SMC..."

Cooperative members also have to assign not only their crops but also their "personal and real properties" as collateral and are bound to "strictly follow the technology and farm production schedule prescribed by SMC through the cooperative; and use the farm equipment, production inputs, agricultural chemicals and other forms for the production of cassava, corn or coffee in his enrolled farm sourced or provided by the cooperative for the project."

Any deviation from these obligations will subject the farmers' land to arbitrary takeover and management by the cooperative, "without prejudice to other appropriate sanctions and legal courses of action by the cooperative against the member."

The study’s thorniest proposal, however, is the fast-tracking of land distribution to farmers. "The overall impact of cassava production cannot be meaningfully felt by farmers unless they own the lands," the study stresses.

That this is easier said than done is all too clear in Pinggot, where Dela Cruz's cooperative was granted a 7,000-hectare CBFMA by Cerilles after the then environment secretary arbitrarily junked a previous requirement for local government endorsement before such concessions may be issued.

With the granting of CBFMA, Cerilles also revoked an agreement forged during the Aquino administration that called for the distribution of a substantial portion of the land covered by the concession to long-time settlers under the agrarian reform law. 

Julius Mariveles, secretary general of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) - Negros said that in other areas where cassava plantations are being set up, "it is not improbable that the 'cooperative' scheme first applied to Cojuangco's 11 haciendas may also be applied, this time, perhaps, through the cooperatives."

‘Godfather of Agrarian Reform’

The scheme, for which ousted president Joseph Estrada hailed his close associate and political patron as the "Godfather of Agrarian Reform," involves turning over a collective CLOA to former farm workers, making them putative owners of the land, in exchange for agreeing to a joint agribusiness venture in which the landowner retains a majority stake and management rights.

Activists have dismissed the "cooperative" scheme as a farce that makes the tillers as owners only on paper when they actually continue to be indentured laborers.

Even without actually setting up a cooperative system, Mariveles notes that, "the cooperatives set up by Cojuangco’s alleged dummies such as Dela Cruz, will effectively ensure that whether they actually have CLOAs to the land or not the farmers remained bound to bowing to the capitalists’ will, planting only what they are allowed to plant, using only the implements and inputs they are allowed to use and accepting only the payment allowed them. They, in effect, remain serfs, indentured labor."

Apprehensions

Because of this apprehension, Pinggot farmers supported by the Kabankalan Diocese and other sectors, have been opposing the cooperative's entry into their village. Peasant communities in Candoni, Cauayan, and Kabankalan where cassava plantations are also reportedly being planned have begun to organize themselves in preparation for opposing their entry as well.

But, as recent developments have shown, not even the peasants' organized strength may not be enough to prevent the entry of the cassava plantations in the face of armed coercion.

Data from the U.P. study and farmers’ testimonies cite Paduano's admission that the RPA is "protecting" the Pinggot "cooperative." Paduano, also known as Carapali Lualahti, said so much in an earlier radio interview when he admitted that indeed the RPA is "protecting" Cojuangco's "cooperative" in Pinggot and would extend the same privilege to "any capitalist" who would bring in similar projects that would "benefit the masses."

In the same interview, Paduano also admitted that relatives of RPA members were members of Salvaccopa.

These revelations indicate a nascent, perhaps more incendiary, stage in the continuing conflicts that have long been rending Negros' social fiber.

Already accused by an ever-suspicious military of being "communist fronts," organized farmers, like those in Pinggot, also say they are under threat from the RPA.

So protective does the RPA appear to be of Pinggot that, recently, Alfredo Savillo, Jr., chairman of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) in the village was "banished" from the whole of the CHICKS area after defying RPA orders not to tell media about the armed rebels’ attempts to coerce Pinggot officials from pursuing corruption charges against their barangay captain.

Recently, southern Negros farmers also told of how the RPA or members of organizations linked to the rebels have been actively campaigning for the cassava plantations in Candoni, Cauayan and Kabankalan City.

Not surprisingly, with the signing of the controversial peace agreement between the RPA and the Estrada administration in December 2000, came the revelation that Dela Cruz, whose wife has succeeded him as mayor, is "senior military adviser" of the rebels’ negotiating panel. Cojuangco was the "intervenor" who sped up the forging of the pact.

Indeed, with the way things seem to be shaping up in Negros, there is more to the cassava - the lowly "balinghoy" - than meets the eye. The corporate scheme and the politics being played by the RPA are heating up the long-simmering social volcano that the generations-old sugar industry has brought. It won’t be long before Cojuangco and others like him will be enmeshed in a peasant unrest that could turn radical overnight. Bulatlat.com

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