GMA’s Hybrid Rice Program is Not For Small Farmers (Conclusion)

By Hetty Alcuitas
People’s Media Center Reports
Reposted by Bulatlat.com

Devlin Kuyek’s report, “Hybrid Rice in Asia: An Unfolding Threat,” was the result of a collaborative study of seven Asian farmers organizations and NGOs last year. The groups were the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (Philippine Peasant Movement or KMP), Genetic Resources Action International (Grain), Masipag, Philippine Greens, Biothai (Thailand), PAN Indonesia and Ubinig (Bangladesh).

Kuyek points out that the most serious problem of hybrid rice is that it is not intended for small farmers. Ironically, IRRI’s own head of the hybrid rice program, Dr. S.S.Virmani, also says the same thing.  “This technology is not for farmers still struggling at the level of two or three tons,” Virmani says. “The cost of hybrid seed, being 10 to 15 times higher than that of ordinary seeds of rice, discourages farmers from taking advantage of the hybrid technology.”

“It is only ‘appropriate’ or intended for wealthy farmers on the irrigated lowlands,” writes Kuyek.

Like Kuyek and Virmani, Lulu Ilustre, chief of staff of the President’s One Million Jobs Office, also admits that the hybrid rice technology is not intended for small farmers. More pointedly, Emmanuel Yap, national coordinator of Masipag, believes small and poor farmers will be the hardest hit by the introduction of hybrid rice technology. “Gusto nila mawawala ang mga maliliit na magsasaka (They want to get rid of small farmers),” says Yap.

A scientist partner of Masipag, Dr. Charito Medina, says farmers who are buried in debt to cover production costs of seeds, chemical fertilizers and pesticides will be devastated by an attack of pests or diseases as a result of the use of hybrid rice. Eventually, he adds, they will be forced to sell their land to make way for large landholdings or be forced into contractual-growing arrangements with local or transnational corporations.

"(Hybrid rice promoters) are not solving the problems on the ground," says Yap. "Even without hybrid rice technology, farmers cannot achieve their maximum potential because of a lack of irrigation, tools and most importantly, land."  

Faulty genetic make-up

Furthermore, studies and scientists confirm that hybrid rice is vulnerable to pests and diseases such as bacterial leaf blight especially during the wet season.

Yap, in particular, says this susceptibility is passed down from the original wild rice in China. He explains that if a monocrop is attacked by a pest, it will spread quickly, citing in particular the outbreak of tungro across Asia in 1970, which virtually wiped out the Philippine rice crop for the year. Planted over a large area, the crop will develop resistance to pests and result in new pests and diseases.

"While it's true you may get a higher yield under ideal conditions, hybrid rice is susceptible to diseases," says Dr. Medina. “Hindi sturdy ang make-up niya. Parang isang bata mataba, pero masakitin (Its make-up is not sturdy. It's like a child who is fat but sickly).”

Medina says there may be isolated successful cases of hybrid rice. He qualifies, however, that the reported yield of six to 11 cavans per hectare will come about under "ideal conditions" such as adequate water, fertile soil, and if the farmer can afford to buy the necessary inputs and seeds.

"Under a rigorous environment they are the first ones to expire," says Medina. In contrast, he says, native traditional varieties can withstand harsher conditions.

Never-ending rat-race

Because of hybrid rice's susceptibility to disease, Yap says, agrochemical corporations will develop new chemical pesticides and fertilizers, and scientists will use genetic engineering to create pest and disease resistance. In the Philippines, newer hybrid varieties are being developed with resistance to bacterial blight. This will once again increase farmer's production costs and also negatively affect health and the environment, he warns.

"This is a never-ending race between the pest and the scientist," says Yap. “Ang kawawa doon, ang magsasaka (The farmer is the one who suffers).” They will be dependent on these corporations for chemicals and seeds. The Filipino farmer will technically become a lowly laborer of agrochemical transnational corporations."

"Hybrid rice is part of the technology and agricultural research that is moving control away from the farmer and toward big agricultural corporations," says Dr. Medina. "They are using agriculture as a business, not for the good of the people but for profit."

The issue of patenting and intellectual property rights is also an important issue that emerged through the Gene Revolution.

“With global acceptance of industrial property rights on plants and the advent of genetic engineering, the former tycoons of the immensely profitable agrochemical industry have sat down to feast,” writes Kuyek. “Within a few short years, the largest pesticide companies in the world have taken oligopoly positions in most seed sectors – particularly those dominated by hybrids.”

According to the study, between 1997-1999, transactions by these companies in the seed industry topped US$18 billion. They also control around 80 percent of all research and development in agriculture biotechnology.

Today nearly 80 percent of the world’s farmlands sown to transgenic crops is devoted to plants that have been designed to be sprayed with herbicides.

Environmental and health impacts

Critics of the Green Revolution say the widespread use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides in the 1970s-1980s effectively reduced the fertility of large parts of the country’s agricultural land. An example is Nueva Ecija province where, Yap says, an area of land required seven bags of fertilizer to produce palay several years ago. Now, he says, 14 bags are needed to produce the same or lesser yield.

"Nasira ang acidity ng kemikal sa lupa (The chemicals destroyed the land's acidity),” explains Yap. With more chemical use projected with the use of hybrid rice, he fears more and worse, irreversible damage.

Echoing the same fears, Dr. Quijano of PAN-Philippines warns against the increased use of chemical pesticides and fertilizers that come with HYVs and hybrid rice. “Hindi lang high-yielding variety ang dinadala nila kundi high-killing toxicity. Ang mga institusyon katulad ng IRRI, mga korporasyon at mga gobyerno ang nagtulak sa paggamit ng nakalasong ng pestisidyo na dati hindi ginagamit ng mga magsasaka (It is not only a high-yielding variety, but also high-killing toxicity. It was institutions like IRRI, corporations and governments that pushed the use of poisonous pesticides never used before by farmers),”he says. 

Quijano, who teaches pharmacology at the University of the Philippines, says 12 million people worldwide have been poisoned by pesticides. In the Philippines, he says, scientific research also reveals a 40-percent increase in cases of cancer and diseases of the nervous and reproductive systems, particularly among farmer families. He also cites the deaths of seven former IRRI workers from probable pesticide and chemical exposure in IRRI test fields. The latest victim was Raymundo Mercado who died of a stroke and liver disease last October 12.

Rejected by consumers

Kuyek's study also reports that hybrid rice in China has a poor taste. "Consumers do not like hybrid varieties," reads the study. "Much of the crop is purchased by the state and...used in state programs to feed the urban poor, stored in the country's rice stocks, or used as animal feed."  

Ilustre, meanwhile, says “Mestizo” which is unavailable in the Philippine market, is somewhat glutinous. Sources, however, say it is also not pure white, which may discourage consumers from buying.

With complaints of high production costs, susceptibility to pests and diseases and negative effects on farmers, consumers and the environment, the Hybrid Rice Commercialization Program (HRCP) is not turning out to be the glowing success story that the government would like it to be. It so far has not resulted in the speedy creation of jobs as President Arroyo had promised.

What's in a job?

In her 2002 SONA, President Arroyo boldly claimed 1,007,993 jobs in agriculture had already been created through two implementing agencies, the Department of Agriculture and the Office of the President for Million Jobs Program. This contributed to an increase in net employment of 852,000 jobs reported by NSO in October 2001.

The NSO and the Office of the President define a job as at least 90 days of employment in a year, or three months. In agriculture this is commonly known as "seasonal" work.

Critics say that government’s census authorities make it appear that unemployment in the country is small by classifying those underemployed or who only find irregular jobs but have no work most of the year as employed. They also aver that if the hybrid rice technology will not redound ultimately to the benefit of the country’s small farmers – people who constitute the rural countryside’s largely unemployed or underemployed population – then who is the President referring to when she says the program will generate one million jobs? Sixty percent of Filipino farmers are estimated to live below subsistence level.

Even House members disagree that the program will generate significant employment for the poor. In a report of the Preliminary Findings of the House Committee on Oversight on the President's Commitment in Her SONA of 2001, chaired by Rep. Joey Sarte Salceda, committee members qualified that "the jobs created are still not permanent in nature" at all.

"The nature of seasonal employment generated might not make a significant dent or decrease on a long-term basis on the labor unemployment rate in the agriculture sector, which has been increasing by at least 20 percent every year," reads the report. "The Committee believes that the President may wish to consider re-focusing her next SONA target to generate 'one million profitable farmers' instead of the creation of 'one million jobs'."

Politics of food

So why is the government aggressively promoting what critics describe as the flawed technology of hybrid rice? KMP’s Mariano says the issue of rice and its control is a political one.

"Rice is the staple food for half of the world's population. It is extremely important for Asia and is therefore aptly described as a 'political crop’," said Mariano in a speech during the first National Peasants-Scientists Conference at the University in Los Baños, Laguna, last month. "The one who controls the production and distribution of rice has an invaluable weapon to control the whole of Asia."

Kuyek's study also says "nearly all the seed companies conducting research and development of hybrid rice in Asia...are owned by or linked to the world's largest seed companies." The study lists the world's top three agrochemical TNC's: Syngenta, Aventis and Monsanto are all involved in the production of hybrid rice seeds in Asia.

PAN-AP’s study also reveals that, “some 90 seed companies are now competing for the predicted US$20 billion opportunity for GE seed varieties by the year 2010. This is 80 percent of the entire global commercial seed market.”

Eventually, Kuyek’s research reveals, it is the giant agrochemical companies involved in the hybrid rice-seed industry in the Philippines and the rest of Asia and not the small farmers who will be the biggest beneficiaries of this new technology.

“Just a few corporations are likely to reap whatever is to be gained from hybrid rice,” writes Kuyek.

These corporations, particularly the US-based Monsanto, have been accused by international NGOs as promoting technology and all sorts of agricultural inputs as a way of controlling the production and distribution of grain and other staple products. In the long term, their monopolistic practices only aggravate global poverty, malnutrition, diseases and environmental destruction, critics say.

Kuyek says, the promotion of hybrid rice aims to "boost the productivity of a particular group of farmers who can sustain a private seed industry" under which these TNCs will be able to reap more profits.

Even the Office of the President itself does not hide the fact that their One Million Job program is "market-driven and private-sector-led." Ilustre cites the government's lack of funds and bureaucracy as the reasons why they are looking to the private sector to support the technology.

No to land reform

In a newspaper column, Presidential Adviser Lorenzo wrote that the government should "shift towards being less like a bureaucratic and regulatory body, and more like a customer-oriented partner of the private sector".

In the same column, he also called on the government to stop land reform. "Maybe it is time for the government to pause in its land distribution efforts," wrote Lorenzo. "Many of us in Mindanao who pioneered in agriculture, put our savings into building our farms, struggled with disease and insurgency and many other difficulties, suddenly found ourselves being asked to give up our land. Additional land acquisition under land reform should be put on hold until the original owners have been properly and fairly paid, and until the land beneficiaries have been provided with all the tools (and the training and market access) to ensure that they can properly nurture the land to produce goods which will help them secure a better life."

Coming straight from a presidential adviser, this economic philosophy runs smack against the immediate interest of the broad masses of peasants: to own land of their own. It is clear that the market-oriented objectives of the President’s hybrid rice program are diametrically opposed to the decades-old aspiration of the peasants to own land, which they believe is their only way out of a semifeudal exploitation and to live a decent life.

In fact, many farmers and scientists alike see no need for the hybrid rice program. Farmers such as those in Masipag and Sibol ng Agham at Teknolohiya (Sibat, Wellspring of Science and Technology), a farmer support institution, believe that the knowledge needed for sustaining rice production is already in the farmers’ hands through their own experience and practice.

Shen Maglinte, Sibat spokesperson, says, "Science and technology in agriculture can be used to improve traditional seed rice varieties. These can become high yielding through time-tested farming systems, some of which were already being practiced by our forefathers….We can satisfy the nation's food requirements by just using sustainable farming methods."

For his part, Mariano says, “The high yielding varieties have done the Philippines a disservice and many farmers are now turning their backs on them.”

Masipag says they have 1,897 farmer members who no longer use chemicals in their rice fields. Facunla is one of them. After years of planting inbred HYVs on his one-and-a-half hectare land, he went organic and decided to plant traditional native rice varieties with no chemical fertilizers or pesticides.  

Going organic has not been easy, Facunla says, as the benefits of higher yields and income and a sustainable environment will only be seen in the long-term. But like other organic farmers, he says his use of sustainable farming methods has strengthened his tie to the land. He says he is empowered with the knowledge, skills and confidence to do what he and his ancestors have perfected for generations: plant, grow and harvest rice, without any chemical, corporate or government interference.

He says that confidence is something the landlords, the government and agrochemical TNCs can never take away.

Facunla joined other farmers, scientists and advocates from around the world in a rally last October 29 in front of IRRI in Los Baños, Laguna. The protesters then held a People's Street Conference in front of the Shangri-la Hotel in Makati City to protest the Annual General Meeting of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) being held in Manila.

After setting up photo exhibits exposing the effects of the Green and Gene Revolutions on poor farmers, hotel security guards dispersed the protesters. Unfazed, the farmers, scientists and other advocates vow to continue their fight against the corporate control of agriculture. They say their lives are at stake. PMC Reports 

(First of two parts: Pangako sa 'Yo’: President's One Million Jobs Program Headed for Disaster, Say Farmers and Scientists)

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