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CAPAS,
Tarlac—Lawmakers should pass the bill extending the
Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) to
distribute lands to landless farmers.
However,
to increase food production vis-à-vis the massive land
conversion of agricultural areas for other purposes,
rebel leader-turned-farmer Bernabe Buscayno said the
Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), the program’s lead
implementing agency, should focus more on the
implementation of support services to make farms more
productive.
Also
known as Kumander Dante, Buscayno, who founded the New
People’s Army in 1969 which became the military wing of
the Communist Party of the Philippines, said the program
had already done so much to improve the living condition
of the farmers through CARP, yet so much still needs to
be done.
He cited
among the many benefits to the farmers in the province,
aside from having their own land, the farm-to-market
roads, postharvest facilities and irrigation, that were
constructed over the years.
“With
farm-to-market roads, farmers are able to bringing their
produce to the market much faster and easier,” he said.
According to Buscayno, farmers realize the benefit of
the program, but could not appreciate it, because as
years go on, their demand for better and improved
quality of life also increases.
“Before,
farmers would only ask for puto at kutsinta for
merienda, now, they ask for hamburger,” he said,
insisting that over the years, farmers’ living condition
has improved.
The
former rebel leader said extending CARP, the centerpiece
of former President Corazon Aquino’s social justice
program, will allow support services to trickle down to
the communities and sustain the gains in terms of
poverty alleviation.
The
unequal distribution of wealth such as land and
hopelessness because of poverty, he said, are among the
reasons the poor who are desperate enough resort to
alternative solutions, believing that the solution to
their problem is change in government, referring to
those who join the revolution like himself.
Buscayno,
who was arrested in 1976, was one of the more than a
hundred political prisoners who were ordered released
from prison by the Aquino administration as part of the
government’s peace and reconciliation effort after
assuming power in 1986. In 1988, CARP was launched.
Buscayno,
who now leads a farmers’ cooperative in this town,
remains hopeful that the program will continue to
benefit landless farmers who remain as mere farm worker
or tenants of big landlords.
The
former rebel leader established the Tarlac Integrated
Modernization Cooperative in 2000, which introduced farm
mechanization that makes rice farming a lot easier using
mechanical machines specifically designed to do the work
of a farmer from planting seed to harvesting the
grains.
The
cooperative’s farm mechanization project suffered
setbacks and eventually had to be stopped in 2005, as
the machines that were acquired from Taiwan broke down
because of natural wear and tear.
However,
he said they learned valuable lessons as to how farm
mechanization should be able to make farms more
productive.
“What we
need is political will and the cooperation of farmers.
Otherwise, this will not work. I’m still hopeful that
with proper government intervention, this farm-
mechanization project will work out well in the future,”
he said.
Through
farm mechanization, planting of rice in one hectare of
rice field which used to require 20 people in more than
a week from land preparation to planting can be done in
a day or two.
The
technology is being applied in major rice-producing
countries in Southeast Asia such as Taiwan and Vietnam.
However, the use of technology requires at least a
minimum area of 100 hectares, to be more effective and
economical.
He said
such requires political will, as well as the cooperation
of farmers who own only one to three hectares to
synchronize planting of rice to be able to make the
technology work.
Buscayno
said to make farm mechanization work, there’s a need for
infrastructure development—such as the construction of
roads to allow the machines to reach the farms without
obstruction. Such, he said, requires government
support.
“Farmers
can’t construct roads so that the machines can access
the farms. But farmers can’t do that,” he said.
He said
with productive farms, farmers will no longer have to
look for alternative livelihood and leave their land
idle or worse, sell them to real-estate developers,
eventually triggering land conversion.
“If
farms are productive, farmers will not look for
alternative livelihood. They will stick to farming.
More farmers will be encouraged to plant in their idle
land, thus solving the problem of poor food production,”
he said. |
