Oil Find in Negros
Fisherfolk fear displacement
After completing a one-year exploration
activity, two firms, the Japan Petroleum Exploration Co. Ltd (JAPEX) and a
Canadian company Forum Exploration Inc. (FEI), are reportedly finalizing a
25-year contract to extract and produce oil from Tanon
Strait. Tanon
Strait is a narrow channel about 3
kms deep, 185-km long between Cebu and Negros.
By Karl G. Ombion
Bulatlat
|
Tanon Strait: A major fishing ground
providing needs of millions in Visayas. But for how long? |
ESCALANTE City,
Negros Occidental – After completing a one-year exploration activity, two
firms, the Japan Petroleum Exploration Co. Ltd (JAPEX) and a Canadian
company Forum Exploration Inc. (FEI), are reportedly finalizing a 25-year
contract to extract and produce oil from Tanon Strait. Tanon Strait is a narrow channel about 3
kms deep, 185-km long between Cebu and Negros in central Philippines. It
is the extension of a major fishing ground with the Visayan seas in the
north, and the Cebu Strait in the south.
|
The Department of
Energy - Region 7 (DoE 7) revealed that Tanon Strait has huge deposits of
oil and natural gas, estimated at one billion barrels, bigger than the
Malampaya oil fields in Palawan. This corroborates earlier news releases
from Cebu that oil and natural gas deposits were discovered by residents
of the coastal city of Toledo and Alegria town along Tanon
Strait.
But small fishers
organizations and coastal residents along the towns of the strait are
alarmed over these developments. They have forged an alliance called
“Negros Fishers’ Forum.” The Forum was organized to protect sea resources
from the threat of destruction by government and corporate ventures such
as the planned oil extraction at Tanon
Strait.
According to sources
from the Department of Agriculture - Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic
Resources (DA-BFAR-R7), Tanon Strait is among the top ten major fishing
grounds in the country. It produces big and quality fish stocks,
including blue marlin and tuna. It is also famous for its schools of
dolphins, attracting a growing number of foreign and local tourists each
year.
Seismic surveys and exploration
Editho Namion,
spokesperson of the fisherfolk alliance Pamalakaya in Negros Negros, told
Bulatlat that they noticed first signs of the oil exploration activity
last year. Fisherfolks were alarmed over sightings of a big and modern
boat, R/V Veritas Searcher, assisted by two tugboats Tbn-1 and Tbn-2,
which was dragging long and huge cables and pipes and planting the
materials deep into the Tanon seas for weeks. The same took place sometime
early in May of this year.
With the help of
PAMANA-Cebu and their allied NGOs in Cebu, Namion and his group checked
with the DoE 7 and experts in Cebu. They found that the reported incidents
were seismic surveys and preliminary explorations undertaken by FEI and
JAPEX. Seismic survey using air guns and other digging equipment appraise
strait’s the geophysical surface, including its magnetic property,
electric conductivity and radioactive emission, to determine oil and
natural gas deposits.
Oil
exploration contract
Citing Cebu media
reports, Director Victorino Labio of DoE 7 confirmed the explorations,
saying that it is part of the government’s efforts to generate local oil
and energy sources to meet the country’s rising demand for oil. It also
admitted that due to the government’s lack of funds and technological
capacity, it sought the help of Japan and Canada, which have already been
undertaking oil explorations in the country.
According to DoE
records, the Canadian company FEI spent $3 million for the project, while
the Japan JAPEX infused $6 million and provided the exploration
facilities. Namion however added that “these exclude the loan acquired by
the Philippine government as its counterpart in the project.”
Namion said that they
learned that JAPEX and FEI have a seven-year contract with the Philippine
government to undertake oil exploration in the country. So far, the survey
they conducted at the Tanon Strait turned out to be the most promising,
Namion added.
Corporate interests
Namion said that when
these outputs are consolidated and finalized, the JAPEX and FEI will forge
a 25-year contract with the Philippine government for the actual
extraction and production of oil and natural gas deposits.
When this happens,
Namion said, “it will not be the Philippine government and the Filipino
people that will benefit from the project, but foreign monopoly
corporations.”
“Not only will the
Filipino people pay the costs of these projects in the form of loan
payments but will also suffer the costs of the destruction of the
environment. Worse, they will not even benefit from this project,” Namion
warned.
Namion cited the case
of the foreign-funded and controlled Malampaya Deep water Gas-to-Power
Project at the off-shores of Palawan.
The project, which started in 2001, was able to extract about three
trillion cubic feet of gas, 120 million barrels of condensate, and around
57 million barrels of crude oil.
According to Namion,
although the project is a joint venture between the Philippine National
Oil Company-Exploration Corporation (PNOC-EC), Shell Philippines
Exploration (SPEX) and the Chevron Texaco, only the latter two companies
control and benefit from it.
“What is even sad,”
Namion added, “is that the government, through PNOC-EC, plans to sell its
10 percent stake in the Malampaya project.”
Environmental destruction
The Negros Fishers
Forum said that the oil exploration will not only deprive fisher folks and
coastal residents of their main source of living but it will ultimately
destroy one of the major sources of living of most people in the Visayas
islands.
The use of
high-voltage air-guns used to dig the sea-beds of the Strait, and huge
boats with long cables and pipes spread around the Strait, are dangerous
to fishes, including the huge schools of dolphins, fish egg sanctuaries,
corals, and other marine resources, and even small fishers plying the
seas. Even commercial and cargo ships passing the Strait face the risks of
being caught by electric shocks, and their motors by pipes and cables.
In fact, Namion said
that some small fishers from the towns of Tuburan, Tabuelan, San Remigio,
Medellin, Daan Bantayan, Sta. Fe and Toledo
City on the side of Cebu, and those
in Escalante, Toboso, Calatrava, Guihulngan, La Libertad , Vallerhermoso
and San Carlos City in Negros, have already experienced the effects of the
exploration. The effects include fishkills, destruction of fishing nets,
and dangerous obstructions caused by pipes and cables.
Namion also reported
that prior to the start of the exploration last year, some coastal towns
in Cebu have passed ordinances like the establishment of more fish
sanctuaries, color coding for fishers, coastal zoning plans and limiting
fishing in municipal waters. These have affected hundreds of small
fishers. In Negros, local government units in towns affected by the
project, have also restricted fishing in municipal waters, and toward the
middle of Tanon
Strait, Namion added.
As a result, fishers
have noted a marked reduction in the fish catch for the last six months,
with most getting an average of only 1-3 kilos of small fishes for 3-6
hours fishing.
Wilbert Dimol,
chairman of PAMANA-Sugbo, added that despite their protests, the
Environment and Management Bureau have given the exploration project a
Certificate of Non-Coverage.
Namion hit earlier
moves by the provincial government of Negros Occidental to limit fishing
in the Visayan Sea, establish more eco-tourism and so-called fish
sanctuaries in several coastal towns in northern Negros. It also had a
joint proposal with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR)
to impose a five-year moratorium in commercial fishing in the entire
Visayan Sea.
Namion also slammed
local government units for “not informing the people” of the oil
exploration in the Tanon
Strait, and “enforcing all sorts of
restrictions without the benefit of public consultations and hearings.”
Projects and measures
like these, Namion opined, are just offshoots of the government’s
“globalization” policies, which now include its destructive mining code of
1995, fishery code of 1997, and the Agriculture and Fisheries
Modernization Act, which favor big business and foreign monopoly
capitalists corporations.
The Negros Fishers
Forum, in a press conference yesterday, vowed “to oppose the project, and
will exert all efforts to defend their rights and protect the national
economy and patrimony from imperialist plunder and exploitation.”
Namion and Dimol said
that they will “inform and mobilize as many small fishers and coastal
residents in the Visayas, to effectively frustrate the implementation of
the oil exploration project.
Richard Sarrosa,
chairman of Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas-Negros, said that they are
also demanding that the Macapagal-Arroyo administration intervene on the
issue, and take concrete measures to stop the harmful and destructive oil
exploration at Tanon
Strait. Bulatlat
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