Benguet Officials to Charge BPI with Economic Sabotage

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – The provincial government is considering the filing of a legal case, economic sabotage, against officials of the Bureau of Plant and Industry (BPI) as a last resort to put a stop to illegal importation of vegetables.

BY TINA SALES
Bulatlat.com/Northern Dispatch

This developed as local officials at the provincial and municipal levels joined forces with traders and farmers compiling pieces of evidence.

“We are in the process of reviewing available papers and gathering at the same time some important documents to determine squarely the technical and legal aspects for filing of economic sabotage against officials of BPI,” Benguet Gov. Raul Molintas told reporters.

The planned move stemmed from new information gathered by the Anti-Smuggling Task Force, among the members of which include La Trinidad Council Trade and Commerce Chairman John Kim and presidents of the various traders’, distributors’ and farmers’ groups Benguet Vegetable Distributors Cooperative Chairman Alfredo Alangdeo, Early Birds Traders’ Association President Edson Simeon and Bagsakan Municipal Clusters Vegetable Traders’ Association, among others.

The group found early this month that former BPI Director Blo Umpaar Adiong issued an agency memorandum order allowing the importation of ginger, potatoes and carrots from China on June 20 last year. Likewise a memorandum letter to all importers dated Dec. 12 suspended the importation of carrots and potatoes from China.

Adiong apparently issued the order upon the recommendation of former BPI Quarantine Larry Lacson for the agency to accredit six processing facilities said to have met the Philippine and international standards subject to four conditions. These conditions included the issuance of import permit (IP), phyto-chemical certificate (PC), presentation of original IP and PC to the plant and that any of the three documents shall only be processed at the BPI-accredited facilities in China. Lacson made the recommendation after a six-day visit to China for the conduct of a Pest Risk Analysis (PRA) of Chinese vegetables.

Questionable procedures

Kim and company, however, strongly questioned the procedures saying that the six–day PRA made by Lacson does not merit the issuance of such recommendation because “it would normally take six to eight months to complete the test and be able to get and determine the toxicity level of vegetables, among others.”

The group also questioned the six facilities indicated by Adiong in his memo. Kim said that the document particularly specified only for ginger and did not include potatoes and carrots, saying that “there is an apparent move to mislead stakeholders with the inclusion of the two additional items.”

The group also doubted the authenticity of Dec. 12, 2003 letter suspending the importation of carrots and potatoes.

“When we questioned Lacson on the content of his recommendation specifically on the importation of carrots and potatoes, he personally told us that Adiong issued a verbal order to suspend the importation of carrots and permit and that no official written order was made. Then, three days after, we got hold of the December 12 order written in a plain bond paper indicating it was done hurriedly to cover-up certain irregularities in the agency.”

As this developed, Molintas made a formal query on the new findings made by the group as indicated in his letter to DA secretary Luis Lorenzo dated Jan. 5.

Meanwhile, Molintas learned that there was 2,000 unused import permits missing between November to December 2003 from the BPI, “they might have been used during the holiday season that is why there was an influx of imported vegetable last December.”

Molintas said that depending on the on-going investigation being conducted by his office on this recent development, he enjoined all concerned groups including other provinces to join Benguet in filing a class suit of economic sabotage against BPI officials.

Meanwhile, prices of high value crops such as broccoli, and cauliflower including carrots reportedly continued to decrease. Wholesale price is pegged between three to five pesos per kilo in the two last weeks.

“Only last Friday, the Bureau of Customs confiscated four truck/vans of onions mixed with carrots from China,” Kim disclosed. Bulatlat.com

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