It was close to noon on the rice fields of Brgy. Soledad in Sta. Rosa, Nueva Ecija, just a few kilometers south of the provincial capital Cabanatuan. At the road’s edge, Nanay Emma, 60, uses a makeshift rake in laying out her stock palay seeds to soak in the sun.

Despite her age, she opts to manually dry the seeds instead of using solar dryers to reduce production costs. “Kaunti na nga lang ‘yung naaani namin, ibabayad pa sa pagpapatuyo,” she said. She tries as much as possible to reduce the expenses they incur because palay prices have recently fallen at an all-time low.

“Ngayong taon talaga, bumagsak sa siyete [pesos] per kilo [ang palay], kaya swerte ngayong buwan na umakyat na ulit ng P12.90,” she said. “Halos ipamigay na nga namin ngayon ang ani sa sobrang bagsak presyo.”

Signed in February 2018, the Rice Tariffication Law removed the quantity restriction on rice imports, allowing foreign grains to flood the local markets, hence slumping the price of local rice. Together with other community members, the likes of Nanay Emma strive to dampen the devastating effects of the law while dealing with the damning government neglect of the agricultural sector.

Seeding

Nanay Angelina, 73, one of the elders, could only say that they have been lucky this planting season since rains graced their fields just in time. “Pero kung [walang tubig] at hindi umulan, di kami makakapagtanim dito,” she said. “Magugutom kami.” Owing to the dearth of farming infrastructure and facilities in Soledad, they have no choice but to rely on rains on watering their crops.

Because of the uneven flow of rainwater, the swaths of paddy fields would show alternating parts of flooded, cracked, or dried-up fields, stunting the growth of palay in some parts. Still, community members have thought to solve their problem by purchasing, through loaned money that they would collectively pay, a small pump to deliver water from a nearby river to irrigate their crops.

The Soledad farmers’ problems are no different from that of the country. Only a third of the country’s 10.3 million-hectare agricultural lands have access to irrigation facilities, while the millions of hectares left rely on luck and climate variability to water farmers’ crops. But in places where irrigation facilities run, other factors come into play that render them useless.

In Soledad alone, irrigation could have been present had a provincial road not blocked its path leading to the fields. Soledad’s terrain also leans too steeply for any irrigation system to be built and work, but Nanay Angelina believes the government could have found a way for said infrastructure. “Kung gusto nila, pwede naman. Nagawan nga namin ng paraan, e.”

With nearly everything in the whole planting season at the mercy of nature, still many other farmers’ woes are within the control of anyone but themselves. Every beginning of the planting season comes at a high price that nobody could afford. With little to no starting capital to begin planting, the farming community is left with no choice but to subscribe to predatory loans for funds.

Budding

Nanay Emma has been all too familiar with such a scenario as the start of the wet season comes with a dance of hope and despair. Along with the rain, they are also inundated by debt–just to plant in time. Nanay Emma could only joke that they might as well be trapped in “5-6” schemes. “Hindi nga uso rito ang 5-6 dahil palay naman ang ibabayad namin sa nagpapautang,” she quipped.

Carefully jotted down in her small notebook were the expenditures they have so far accrued. Compensation for farmworkers, rent of equipment, fertilizers, and pesticides are just the preliminaries. Harvest would come months later only for them to find their carefully tended grains the collateral for their debts. “Halos pambayad lang ang ani namin … sa pasweldo, pagpabuhat ng palay,” she said.

Nanay Emma could not help but reminisce about last year’s harvest season when palay prices still stood at P19 to P20, just enough to pay their debts and save enough for the next planting season. She said Soledad has been one of the hardest hit since the Rice Tariffication Law came into effect as they have been forced to sell their harvest, this time, at a dreary price of P12 per kilo.

“Nung anihan last year lang kami nakaranas na halos lahat na ng ani namin ay pambayad lang ng utang dahil sa sobrang bagsak ng presyo ng palay,” she said. “Wala na talagang kita, zero na kung zero, lahat pa ng ani, labas.”

Ripening

The whole vicious cycle of paying off debts and planting and the post-harvest hassle of selling produce would be pointless so long as farmers do not, in the first place, own the lands they farm, according to Asiong Ortiz, the Alyansa ng mga Magbubukid sa Gitnang Luzon (AMGL) Nueva Ecija chapter head.

The whole 18-hectare farmland in Soledad originally belonged to Nanay Angelina and Emma’s grandfather. However, during the land reform fiasco in the 90s, their clan was tricked into signing blank cheques that effectively removed their claim over the lands. Two decades later, together with their organization, they have decided to divvy up the land, after making them arable again, through bungkalan.

“Parang binabawi lang naman namin dito ‘yung ninakaw na lupa ng mga pribadong indibidwal sa mga taga-Soledad–na sila naman talaga ang totoong tagapagmana nung lupa,” said Ortiz. He expressed joy as their last year’s bungkalan met no resistance from the landlord who controls their land. As of last November, only six hectares remain uncultivated.

Soledad’s farmlands have become one of the battlegrounds in the fight for genuine agrarian reform. The likes of Nanay Emma and Angelina, together with their organization, have started to fulfill the promise of just and equitable distribution of land that the government has yet to deliver on. 

Farmers have little to nothing to expect from a government that prioritizes munitions over grains. Aside from an agriculture budget that flatlined for the past decade, lawmakers have programmed the 2020 purse to allot four times more money for guns and troops rather than for tractors, irrigation, and the like.

In the face of state neglect and the landed elite’s seizure of farmlands, farmers like Nanay Angelina and Emma will carry on. Until they have been delivered from the grip of landlord greed, and until the state finally acknowledges and treats agriculture as the backbone of the country’s industrial development, the farmers’ fight remains justified. Until then, resistance would be their only recourse. ●

First published in the Collegian’s January 27, 2020 issue.