1.1 Privileging Exports over Crops for Local Consumption

In 2010, less than 0.3 percent of the country’s agricultural outputs were high iron/protein foods. If meat and poultry production are taken into account, high iron/protein foods comprise only 2.5 percent of all agricultural production (see Table 5). Despite serious nutritional shortfalls, 89 percent of all tons of agricultural output consisted of nonfood crops for export, i.e., tobacco, rubber, floricultural commodities, and coffee (see Table 8). For most households, rice represents one-third of the dietary intake, but poor rural households consume as much as two-thirds of their calories in this cereal (David and Balisacan 1995). Even though it is so central to domestic consumption, this grain has not been prioritized in farm land use. In 2009, rice accounted for less than 3 percent of total crop production.⁶ Nearly one-half of the country’s farm land is planted in three crop monocultures: coconuts and bananas (which are prized as “high value exports”) and corn (which provides feed for fish and livestock and raw materials for biofuel production). Between 1980 and 2008, rice lands declined 17.5 percent. On the one hand, total farm land expanded only 2 percent between 1995 and 2008 when the national government prioritized export crops. On the other hand, the agrarian reform program had anti-peasant outcomes (Putzel 1982; Carranza and Mato 2006; Borras 2007; Borras et al. 2007). Rice lands were lost because large landowners were allowed to shield their holdings from redistribution by shifting them to fishponds, government targeted export crops or livestock pastures (Republic of Philippines 1995).⁷ As a result of exemptions, 509,550 hectares of ricelands and 29 percent of vegetable and root croplands were converted to fishponds and targeted export crops between 1988 and 1999 (Domingo 2001). One of the first land conversions occurred during the export “shrimp fever” of the 1980s (Primavera 1997: 820). Even though rice is the central food for domestic consumption, state policies have de-emphasized it because it does not generate foreign exchange. In its 1992 national development plan (Republic of Philippines 1992), the government prioritized the conversion of more than 3 million rice and corn hectares to export crops. The official rationale is that a shrimp crop may earn up to 30 times the profits of rice farming because almost all the prawn are exported.

In its subsequent Medium-Term Development Plan (Republic of Philippines 2000: 29–33), the government called for the transformation of 2 million additional hectares into agribusiness plantations. Rice production is glaringly absent from these policies. In 2005, less than one-third of farm land was being used to cultivate rice while the other two-thirds were being utilized to produce export and nonfood crops. Rice hectares are further threatened because these targets exceed the available farm land and will require conversion of lands that have been growing this grain.⁸ Since 1992, these national globalization agendas have triggered land conversions, both legal and illegal. Since 2000, croplands or cattle pastures have displaced several traditional rice terraces (Taipei Times, 16 June 2005), and 40,000 hectares of ricelands were converted for government-approved ecotourism (Bulatlat, 19 February 2006). Rice disappeared from another 45,000 rice hectares between 2003 and 2007 (Agribusiness Week, 20 July 2008). The government’s Corn Production Enhancement Project subsidized the conversion of 139,000 rice hectares into new corn hybrids to increase this crop for livestock and aquaculture feeds (PDANews, 18 November 2007). In addition to land conversions, ricelands have been destroyed by the salinization caused by commercial fishponds (Primavera 1997).

In addition to loss of ricelands, escalation of rice prices resulted from privatization of the National Food Authority (NFA) that had regulated rice and stabilized prices. “As a result of reforms adopted by the Philippine government to comply with World Bank and Asian Development Bank prescriptions, the role of the NFA in ensuring the country’s food security and price stabilization has been reduced to being a ‘facilitator’ of the market forces– the big rice traders and retailers” (Remollino 2008). State intervention to protect rice is not a peculiar phenomenon that is unique to the Philippines. In fact, 32 countries maintain similar authorities that regulate particular agricultural commodities, including several richer nations.⁹ Originally mandated to acquire at least 12 percent of the country’s rice production, the NFA purchased less than 4 percent of output between 1984 and 2000, and its domestic procurement dropped to 0.05 percent of production between 2001 and 2006. The new government plan is for the NFA to import rice that will be re-sold to traders and retailers. In addition, the private sector will be able to import 183,000 metric tons, even if there is no domestic shortage. Philippine scholars are convinced these changes exacerbate the monopsonistic operation of the country’s rice trade and further threaten the livelihoods of small rice farmers. Before the sharp global price increases of 2007 and 2008, Pelegrina (2003: 2) raised alarm about the power of the country’s rice traders to control inputs, processing and the market price of rice. “By holding on to their stocks, wholesalers create artificial shortages by hoarding rice to bid up prices or by flooding the market with their stocks to reduce prices to artificially lower levels.” A Philippine Senate investigation confirmed that the “Big Seven” rice cartel keeps “consumer prices high through monopsonistic tactics. With limited access to credit or processing and storage of rice, farmers are forced to sell their harvest even at low prices, thus reinforcing the trade/wholesaler control over prices”¹⁰ During the global food crisis of 2007–2008, Philippine economist Cielito Habito contended that the announced grain shortage was artificially “created by long-suspected cartels in the industry that are taking advantage of the tightness of world demand” (Manila Times, 7 April 2008). In July 2009, peasant organizations and many media called for a total overhaul of the National Food Authority, after reports by British newspapers that the Philippine Department of Agriculture was involved in a $200 million kickback scheme connected to 2008 rice imports from Vietnam Manila Times, 9 July 2009, Business Mirror, 9 July 2009).

To complicate matters, the performance of the Philippine rice sector has been far worse than most Asian countries. Between 1995 and 2007, rice production increased far less than the government’s targeted export crops. While rice production rose about 54 percent, bananas increased nearly 77 percent and corn rose 63 percent. However, aquaculture increased 137 percent, reflecting the government’s greater subsidization of these agro-industrial activities. Since access to water is critical to rice farming, public neglect of irrigation infrastructure has a disproportionate impact on the production of this grain. Despite public investment in new irrigation technologies, there were 9 percent fewer irrigated hectares in 2008 than there had been in 1980. National policy is clear. The government allocated less than 0.1 percent of all public agricultural expenditures for rice research and irrigation infrastructure (David and Balisacan 1995, Guste 2008). As a result, less than half of rice farms are irrigated. Between 1990 and 2010, irrigated hectares declined more than 13 percent, reflecting land conversions to other uses. By 2019, less than 15 percent of arable land was irrigated.¹¹ Moreover, 80 percent of rice farmers are still landless, operating small parcels of less than two hectares. Consequently, peasant organizations have been politically active since 2000 to protest failure of the government to redistribute lands legally through the agrarian reform program.¹² In 2008, the Philippine House of Representatives passed Joint Resolution 19 which terminated central elements of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program. Acquisition of lands was deferred indefinitely, and compulsory land acquisition was ended. Opposing officials and peasant groups described the politics over the revisions as “landlord-dominated,” contending that the new act will worsen landlessness and speed up conversion of farm lands to non-farming purposes (Pinoy Press, 20 December 2008).

Publicly declaring the goal of rice-self sufficiency by 2013 (a political promise not met), the Philippine government set the goal of increasing yield per hectare, rather than expanding the farm land that is planted in this important food crop (Philippine Rice Research Institute 2020). “With limited land devoted to food production and more agricultural lands being converted for other purposes,” insists the Department of Agriculture, “the only way we can increase productivity is through an advanced farming technology.” To overcome land shortages, “biotechnology is the solution” of preference (PDANews, 9 November 2007). Philippine dependence on imported Green Revolution technologies began in 1960 when the Rockefeller Foundation launched the International Rice Research Institute as the vehicle to introduce high-yield varieties that required pesticides and fertilizers. The government cemented the transition by ordering removal of traditional varieties and linking credit to hybrid cultivation (Lindio-McGovern 1997: 62–64). While Philippine peasants once cultivated thousands of traditional rice varieties (Shiva 2000: 80), the government promotes the use of certified hybrid seeds (Philippine Rice Research Institute 2020). Despite widespread peasant resistance, the government’s Hybrid Commercialization Program extended seed subsidies, discounted fertilizers, production loans, and guaranteed crop insurance to farmers in an inequitable fashion (PDA News, 22 October 2007).¹³

As practiced by both public and private financial institutions, agricultural credit support is only available to farmers who are using high-yielding seeds, inorganic fertilizers and chemical pesticides– all of which are generally perceived by institutional lenders as assurance of good harvests. This has been widely practiced since the heyday of the Green Revolution, even though there is no Philippine law or official policy that mandates these requirements. This practice has clearly worked to the disadvantage of rice farmers who save, re-use, select and breed their own varieties instead of buying certified seeds. It has also excluded farmers who opt to use organic inputs in growing rice (Searice 2005: 34). By 2005, more than 90 percent of ricelands were planted with hybrid seeds (FAO 2007), but high-yielding varieties are not likely to be a long-term solution.

Because seed cannot be gathered and planted the next season, hybrid rice cultivation is more costly. Indeed, hybrid seeds are priced nearly 17 times higher than indigenous varieties (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 25 April 2005). Increased costs associated with hybrid cultivation are passed to small landless farmers who must tie themselves to debt bondage arrangements with landlords to cover the additional expense of seeds, fertilizers, pesticides and technology. In addition, hybrid cultivation requires greater labor inputs, most of which is supplied inequitably by women (Harden 2008). Moreover, all hybrids are not higher yielding than traditional varieties because some are created to be resistant to special conditions, such as drought (Philippine Rice Research Institute 2020). With funding from the Rockefeller Foundation and the governments of Germany and Japan, the Philippine Rice Research Institute announced in June, 2009 three new hybrid varieties that will be resistant to flooding, drought, and salt (Seedquest, 4 June 2009).

For some of these farmers, the rice hybrids did increase yields, but for many, the crop failed. [There have been many] reports…of standing crops not forming any grain and increased incidences of destructive pests. … Few farmers ended up profiting from the largess [of government subsidies]; rather the money flowed into the pockets of the rural banks and private loan institutions, the suppliers of machineries, the contractors of post-harvest facilities, and most importantly, the agro-chemical and seed companies. Private seed companies are the big beneficiaries of the hybrid rice programme. … Most of the subsidies on seeds were channeled to just one company. … The Department of Agriculture acknowledged in early 2006 that there was a 50–60 percent drop-out rate among farmers who adopted hybrid rice. (GRAIN 2007: 1)

To complicate matters, the government’s Hybrid Rice Commercialization Program has been riddled with problems. Three companies dominate hybrid rice seed marketing: SL Agritech, Bayer, and Bioseed (PDANews, 8 November 2007). While the government is pinning its hopes on Green Revolution solutions, it is hard to see how small farmers will be able to absorb these increased costs when they only receive 9 percent of the retail price of the grain (Intal and Garcia 2005).

Even before the 2008 global rice crisis, one National Food Authority official publicly criticized policy threats to ricelands, stating that “one of the main factors that led to the decrease in rice grain yield is the land-use conversion policy of the government” (Bulatlat, 19 February 2006). At the peak of the 2008 global rice crisis, the government announced its recognition that there has been “a significant increase of land conversions from rice to other agricultural plantations” and imposed a two-year moratorium on such conversions (PIA News, 19 July 2008). Subsequently, the government announced contradictory land-use goals to meet its export growth targets. Twenty-seven provinces use former ricelands to cultivate flowers and ornamental plants for export, and the Department of Agriculture is seeking more foreign investments in this sector (PDA 2009a). In Northern Mindanao, large tracts of land were converted into fishponds to cultivate tilapia for export (Aguiba 2004). Even though the World Bank and the IMF contend that agrofuel policies were responsible for three-quarters of the 140 percent increase in global food prices between 2002 and 2008, the Philippine government expanded its biofuel goals.¹⁴ Legislation to spur biofuel production contradicts the moratorium on riceland conversions by mandating a 10 percent blend of bio-ethanol in gasoline and a 2 percent coco-methyl ester in diesel by 2010 (Republic of Philippines 2009). In 2001, the Philippine Coconut Authority announced its intention to develop 220,790 hectares as new palm oil areas for the emerging biofuels industry.¹⁵

By entering into joint ventures with Philippine companies, foreign corporations will be able to bypass land conversion restrictions (Philippine Journal Online, 30 June 2009). For example, the government signed a 2007 bilateral agreement with the Chinese government, allocating 1.4 million hectares to production of maize, rice and sorghum hybrids that will be processed into ethanol for export to China (Borras et al. 2007: 1560). In 2008 and 2009, the Philippines made land lease agreements for 340,500 hectares with Brunei, Kuwait, New Zealand, Oman, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia (Cruz 2011: 20–22). The government is providing $1,000 subsidy per hectare in raw materials and technology in an agreement for Malaysian investment in 13,500 hectares, and it has leased 400,000 hectares to Pacific Biofuels, a Japanese holding company. The country’s biofuel goals are also aimed at industry.¹⁶ Ford Philippines will manufacture the first Southeast Asian flexible fuel engine, aiming to market 105,000 engines annually.¹⁷ This array of contradictory land use goals makes it evident that there is no systematic national oversight aimed at preventing riceland conversions. By 2013, the Philippines expended more than twice as much on wheat imports, primarily from the United States, as it did on rice imports, reflecting a dramatic shift in urban cereal consumption since the 2008 food crisis.¹⁸ By the second decade of the 21st century, palm oil production is well established in the Philippines and is leading to food insecurity for plantation workers and sharecroppers. Indeed, small producers and waged laborers enter debt bondage with corporate-controlled cooperatives to cover current food costs against future earnings (Montefrio and Dresssler 2018).

1.2 Privileging Export Seafoods over Local Consumption

In addition to the privileging of commercial “high-value” exports over rice, Philippine food security is threatened by the government’s prioritization of fish and shellfish for export. Traditionally, these seafoods provide 70 percent of the animal protein in the Philippine diet (Barut 2004). Even though 2010 total fishery output was nearly 41 percent lower than national needs at traditional levels of consumption, the Philippines redirected 13 percent of its fishery production to exports and nonfood purposes. As a result, the fishery commodities available for domestic consumption fell 66 percent below the country’s nutritional needs (see Table 3). We are convinced that the government’s per capita estimate of 38 kilograms represents an ideal healthy standard for the country, but per capita consumption of fish and shellfish has steadily declined since 1995.¹⁹ We must slash the government’s per capita consumption estimate by 50 percent to achieve a numerical balance between production, domestic consumption, outputs, exports and nonfood uses (see Table 3). In the late 1980s, Philippine scholar Renato Constantino (1988: 39–40) warned that fish exporting had “reduced the availability of these foods to our people in absolute terms” and had raised local prices to the point that “much of what is left is beyond their reach.” Clearly, a high proportion of the Philippine population is eating too little of these nutritious foods, as evidenced by widespread protein shortfalls, iron deficiency anemia and iodine-related health problems since the late 1990s.²⁰

Export fishery production endangers food security in three ways. First, mangrove deforestation for fishponds caused sharp declines in the numbers and biodiversity of wild fish, crustaceans and mollusks. Second, mangrove destruction has been almost entirely at the expense of fishing households that traditionally collected wild foods from these forests (Anderson 1987: 262). For instance, fishpond chemicals have made traditionally collected snails too toxic for human consumption, and other crustaceans and mollusks have been depleted to such an extent that poor households rarely find them in the wild (Primavera 1997). Third, the export strategy removed species from the domestic food chain and has lowered production of locally-consumed species. Because a greater percentage of roundscad is exported, 23 percent less of this fish is now consumed than was the case in 1990.²¹ Similarly, the trend in milkfish production is indicative of the degree to which seafood insecurity is worsening. In the 1960s, milkfish accounted for 95 percent of fishpond production (Primavera 1995), as this species was a staple protein source for the entire country. In 1988, milkfish accounted for 88 percent of the fishpond production, indicating that the country had not yet moved fully into export aquaculture (Philippine Annual Fisheries Profile 1988). “For a very long time, aquaculture in the Philippines was virtually synonymous with milkfish culture, specifically in brackish water ponds, relying totally on natural food” (FAO 2004b: 1).

However, local consumption of milkfish has steadily declined, as this species has been displaced in monocultural fishponds. In the 1980s, aquaculture shifted to shrimp production for export (Yap 1999). “Market forces at the national level stimulated shrimp aquaculture disproportionately in relation to finfish aquaculture, in part because shrimp brought in more foreign exchange. Lower-income domestic fish consumers could not compete in world markets with high-income consumers of shrimp” (Jomo 1991: 39–40). Between 1995 and 2007, milkfish production expanded after it was targeted for export (Philippine Annual Fisheries Profile 1977–2007). In 2005, the Philippines produced 55 percent of the world’s milkfish, and the country exported one-third or more of its production. Consequently, domestic prices for milkfish rose as outputs declined and exporting increased (PDA 2005). By 2009, per capita consumption of milkfish had steadily declined since 1990, and it was rarely eaten by the poor (Agribusiness Week, 26 March 2009).²² Despite that decline in domestic consumption, the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources announced in 2009 its goal of expanding tilapia production for export by converting Northern Mindanao milkfish ponds (Philippine Annual Fisheries Profile 2009, 2010).

2.1 Dependence on Imported Agricultural and Aquaculture Inputs

In 2006, the country spent only one-quarter as much to acquire rice as was expended on imported agricultural inputs. The privileging of exports over production for local consumption has led to heavy dependence on imported agricultural inputs to produce crops, livestock and aquaculture species. While targeting land expansion for export crops, the Medium-Term Development Plan advocates application of high-yield hybrid seeds and inorganic chemicals to increase rice production on fewer hectares (Republic of Philippines 2000). Since 1961, use of pesticides expanded eleven-fold in Philippine agriculture (FAO 2007). The national government has promoted the cultivation of high-yield varieties which take only three months to mature. The more rapid intervals are dependent on chemical fertilizers and pesticides, as well as the use of hand tractors and threshers. The large-scale shift to the use of hybrids that signaled the Green Revolution increased harvests and allowed widespread double cropping. However, it also increased production costs for optimal harvests because hybridized and genetically-modified seeds require fossil-fuel-based fertilizers and pesticides (Mabunay 1995: 340–41; Pollan 2009: 73)

In 2005, farmers and fishpond operators applied 76 kilograms of fertilizer per hectare, 1.3 times more than they used in 1995. Indeed, fertilizer use increased about 3.1 percent annually between 1995 and 2005, and nearly half of these expensive imports were used in fishponds.²⁵ By 2008, fertilizers and pesticides ranked seventh among the country’s most costly imports (PSA News, 14 May 2009). After structural adjustment programs required elimination of government subsidies of inputs, the costs borne by farmers skyrocketed. Between 1990 and 2008, the production cost of corn more than doubled while the 2008 production costs of rice rose to 1.8 times the 1990 level.²⁶ Most of these rising costs lay in imported inputs. By 2008, the cost of all types of imported agricultural inputs was nearly 2.8 times greater than 1994 levels. Even worse, imported agricultural inputs have outstripped the value of agricultural exports. Between 1998 and 2002, imported inputs increased an average of 4.8 percent, but agricultural exports declined an average of 4.9 percent. Even though exports declined 0.2 percent between 2000 and 2002, imported inputs rose nearly 8 percent. By 2006, the country paid out $4 for imported fertilizers and pesticides to every ten export dollars in foodstuffs. In 2010, the country expended 44 cents on imported inputs to every dollar of agricultural and fishery exports, and the national cost of imported agricultural and fishpond inputs continued to rise through 2020.²⁷

Philippine farmers pay higher costs for these imported inputs than other Asian farmers. The Philippine government acknowledges that, in the 1990s, “prices paid for the various fertilizers used by Filipino farmers were nearly double that of the world price. This may be partially due to possible monopolistic pricing since more than half the supply of fertilizers in the market comes from a single company” (Republic of Philippines 2000: 24–25). The Philippine Agricultural Pesticide Institute accounts for 95 percent of the country’s sales, and it acquires those inputs from a few multinational corporations that dominate world trade in these chemicals (Constantino 1988: 56). According to the country’s Medium-Term Development Plan, “there are relatively few farmers willing and able to grow certified [hybrid] rice seeds [because] seed cost is higher here than in Thailand, Vietnam, Indian and China” (Republic of Philippines 2000: 24–25). Despite these harsh realities, the government subsidizes and the International Rice Research Institute advocates heavy reliance on hybrid seeds. This public policy “has had the effect of transplanting a food production system designed for temperate zones to tropic and subtropical areas. Whereas traditional seed varieties are acclimated to Asian conditions, the new seeds require large amounts of fertilizer” (Constantino 1988: 55).

In addition to reliance on hybridized rice seeds, much of the corn grown in the Philippines depends on imported seed and inputs. The Corn Production Enhancement Project subsidizes imported hybrid seeds, processing equipment, tractors, and tube wells (PDA News, 18 November 2007). Since 2007, the Department of Agriculture has conducted field tests and marketed genetically-modified corn seed imported from the US. In return, the government has guaranteed “continued access to the Philippines for an estimated $400 million worth of US commodities and products from biotechnology.”²⁸ Moreover, hybridized and genetically-modified seeds have been imported to grow vegetables and cutflowers, and the government has imported hybridized coconuts and bananas that require large quantities of pesticides. All told, seed and chemical imports make the country’s agriculture dependent on inputs that are marketed by three or four multinational corporations. In addition, the country’s livestock is predominated by hybridized chickens, pigs, cattle, and aquaculture species that have necessitated more than $13 million annually in live animals that serve as breeding stock.²⁹ In 2005, for example, 23 metric tons of breeding cattle were imported to improve beef production for export to China (PDA 2005). One Philippine newspaper comments that “the growing of hybrid pigs, the planting of hybrid corn seeds, and the miracle rice seeds, all guarantee that the multi-billion peso food industry will forever be in the hands of foreigners and the multinationals” (Bulletin Today, 17 September 2004).

In 2006, the Philippines expended $2.2 billion for imported agricultural inputs. In order to have a full assessment of imported inputs, we need to account for items that the official government statistics hide in such a way that scholars might not interpret them as nonfood items. In other words, we need to disaggregate all imported cereals that were fed to animals, all fishery products that were fed to aquaculture or livestock species, processed animal feeds, live breeding animals, fertilizers, pesticides, and agricultural machinery. By doing so, we learn that nearly 60 percent of imported inputs were intended for farm animals and fish while another 10 percent were aimed at expanding cultivation of ornamental plants for export. For every $1 of imported inputs utilized for food production, another $1.50 was absorbed by animals and fish. While many scholars assume that the cereals expense reported by the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics is mostly rice, this is not an accurate assumption. We wonder if the government does not lump cereals together in this misleading fashion in order to give the impression that a majority of the import dollars are allocated to rice purchases for human consumption. When types of cereals are disaggregated by grain type and by food/nonfood sectors, a very different picture emerges. In reality, only about 51 percent of the value of cereal imports is allocated to rice for human consumption.³⁰ While the Philippines expended more than $1.5 billion for imported rice in 2008, the country also paid out $1.1 billion for wheat and other grains for human consumption. For every $2 the country paid for imported rice in 2008, it spent another $1.48 to import wheat, wheat flour, corn meal, and cereal preparations. Nearly one-fifth of expensive American wheat imports are fed to animals.³¹ Even during the 2008 global grain crisis, more than 9 percent of the imported cereals (valued at $259 million) were used as animal feeds. When we take our analysis one step further, an even more disturbing trend emerges. When we combine the separately reported value of imported animal feeds with the cereals consumed by animals, we see that the country expended nearly $969 million for imported inputs to feed animals and aquaculture species. In reality, then, the Philippines imports $3.70 worth of animal feeds to every ten dollars it expends on grains consumed by its people.³²

Animal feeds are also hidden in other categories of official record keeping. More than 73 percent of the fishery imports consisted of fishmeal and feeds to produce shrimp and other export fish. In 2008, these imported fishery feeds were valued at more than $90 million. In comparison to agricultural crops or livestock raising, aquaculture is far more dependent on imported inputs (Philippine Annual Fisheries Profile 2004–2008). Ten importers control distribution of the manufactured fertilizers needed for aquaculture, and fishmeal is regularly imported, primarily from Peru, for use in feeds. Commercial vitamin and mineral mixes are imported by feed manufacturers for use in aquaculture and livestock brands. Three large companies control the production and distribution of fish feeds while five commercial brands supply shrimp feeds. These feeds require seven to ten additives, a majority of them imported. In fact, half to three-quarters of all additives are imported for aquaculture, and a majority are utilized in shrimp feeds (Cruz 1997). Moreover, the value of fish oil is reported in the government category termed “animal and vegetable oils and fats.” Valued at more than $129 million, about 60 percent of these imported commodities are utilized in livestock, pet and aquaculture feeds. When we combine all inputs into agricultural crops, livestock and fishery production, the country expended nearly $2.2 billion dollars on inputs that represented 87 percent of the value of all exported foodstuffs in 2008. To state this another way: the country expends almost the same amount for imported inputs that it earns for exported foodstuffs.

2.2 Meeting WTO Import Requirements

Because of trade liberalization requirements, the Philippines must gradually eliminate tariffs and open its domestic markets to the inflow of most of the same edible products it exports (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 10 June 1986). The main objective of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Agriculture “was to deal with [global] overproduction, rather than to promote agriculture in developing countries.” In the Philippines, the WTO reduction of import protection transformed the country from a food and rice exporter into a food and rice importer (ESCAP 2010: 44). In 1994, the Philippines exported foods that were valued at nearly 98 percent of the value of its food imports. In 2006, the value of imported foods was 1.1 times greater than the value of exported foods. By 2008, the country was importing $2.50 worth of foodstuffs to every dollar’s worth of exported foodstuffs, and most of these imports resulted from trade liberalization.³³

Because the WTO requires countries to import a “minimum access volume” of foodstuffs, the Philippines must import up to 4 percent or more of domestic consumption levels of foods (Pelegrina 2003). For this reason, the country imports more rice than it needs to meet human consumption needs (Ignacio 2005). The value of the country’s agricultural imports has steadily risen since 1998, exactly in the same time period that the country has been pursuing aggressive policies to increase “high value” cash crops and fishery exports. Many of these imported items are produced at surplus levels by the Philippines, and most of the value of food imports is accumulated through foodstuffs other than rice. In 2007, the country exported $1.26 million worth of cassava, a traditional food available at levels well above domestic consumption. Still, the country imported cassava valued at 15 times its tuber exports. Even though it exported surplus corn, the country imported nearly $49 million worth of this commodity in 2007.³⁴ Philippine scholars point out that much of the importation results from domestic industries purchasing cheaper raw foods abroad, then processing them for re-export. For instance, the large volume of imported tuna “does not translate to enhanced food security” because more than 90 percent of it is processed by canneries for re-export (Vera and Hipolito 2006: 57).

2.3 Dependence on Imported Processed Foods

Criticized by western doctors for their ill-health effects, processed products have been imported by Asian countries at soaring prices since 1990 (Global Health Watch 2 2008: 136). Worldwide, processed foods accounted for nearly 38 percent of the value of all imported foods in 2006. That year, the Philippines allocated $1.73 to imported processed foods for every dollar expended on rice.³⁵ This trend toward consumption of imported processed foods reflects the systemic expansion of dietary preferences and luxury foods that predominate in the richer countries. The global agro-industrial food system aims to popularize a worldwide profitable “hegemonic dietary regime” that is grounded in “mass consumption of standard manufactured edible commodities” that replace healthier domestic crops (McMichael 1994: 23–27). As Asian countries become dependent on imported foods, “diets are ruptured from local ecology and tradition and restructured through international food markets” (Bernstein et al. 1990: 26). Since 1980, food imports have altered dietary preferences to the degree that per capita wheat consumption increased 63 percent in rice-consuming Asian societies. At the same time, rice consumption rose only 20 percent worldwide, and the use of traditional root crops fell sharply (McMichael 1998: 103).

Traditionally, Filipinos consumed hundreds of varieties of fish and shellfish (Herre 1945: 158), including small species that the FAO (2012d) considers “trash fish.” In contrast, the country purchased nearly $95 million worth of tuna, mackerel, and milkfish in 2007 (AFSIS 2008). Today, most Filipinos are restricted to a diet of a few types of finfish, and the poor eat the fish with the least protein (Philippine Annual Fisheries Profile 2007). The Philippine Fisherfolk Association contends that the “export-oriented, import-dependent orientation” of the government’s fishery agenda results in “mass flooding of cheap fish imports all over the country,” driving domestic prices down and exacerbating poverty and hunger among fisher households. At the same time, “the country’s best fishery products…do not end up on the tables of ordinary Filipinos but are exported to rich countries” (Pamalakaya Times, 15 March 2009). Through its capture fishing of tuna for export, the country has nearly depleted a seafood that has historically been crucial to the domestic food chain. While shrimp and crab are the most valuable aquaculture exports, these foods are no longer accessible to most Filipinos (Philippine Annual Fisheries Profile 2008). In fact, shrimp is eaten by very few, and per capita consumption steadily declined between 1990 and 2019.³⁶ Japanese consumers devour 3,479 times more shrimp, and Americans ingest 1,800 times more of this shellfish than Filipinos (FAO 2005a). Constantino (1988: 36–40) points to the protein imperialism that results from the global agro-industrial food system. “While Filipino people were experiencing widespread protein deficiency, fish and meat were being exported.” Moreover, the country shipped out high-protein fish and imported less-nutritious varieties, such as canned mackerel, “low-quality items we have to content ourselves with while we export the best for the Japanese to relish.” In 2010, the Philippines exported 342 million tons of high protein seafoods (crustaceans, mollusks, finfish that were once an affordable part of the traditional domestic diet) while it imported more than 382 million tons of less-nutritious finfish and meats. As a result, there was a shortfall of 1.3 kilograms per capita of high iron seafoods.³⁷ While shipping out crustaceans and mollusks that could address widespread iron and iodine deficiencies, the country imported less nutritious protein sources that were too expensive for a majority of Filipinos. Such unequal nutritional exchanges have led to declines in per capita consumption of iron-rich seafoods since 1995. By 2010, Filipinos were substituting 0.8 kilogram of low/no-iron frozen, canned, dried, or smoked fish to every kilogram of fresh fish they consumed in 1995.³⁸ While the Philippines shipped nearly 73 percent of its fishery exports to low hunger countries (see Table 5), its food imports represented losses of 62 percent of the iron and 15 percent of protein embodied in its fishery exports (see Table 7).

As a reflection of the trend toward a profitable global diet, three-quarters of the value of 2010 Philippine food imports was expended for foods that convert into sugars and fats in the human body, including 36 percent for processed foods. In 2016, only 15 percent of the food import budget was spent to acquire high iron/protein foods while 4 percent was allocated to vegetables and fruits (see Table 6). Nearly one-third of the country’s food imports are high-priced due to public subsidies by the United States, including $351 million in wheat, $216 million in soy products and $152 million in dairy products annually. More than half the $1.7 billion in US agricultural exports to the Philippines are processed foods, and the US is its “top food and beverage supplier.” In addition, the US targets the Philippines as a growing market for processed beef, turkey, and chicken for “upper income consumers.” By 2007, Filipinos were consuming more than $41 million annually in US snack foods, condiments, sauces, gum, bottled water, soft drinks, and alcoholic beverages.³⁹ Because of such imports– many of which are considered unhealthy in the countries that export them– Filipinos include less rice and fish in their diets than they did in 1961 (FAO 2007). By 2013, fishery commodities accounted for less than 15 percent of per capita dietary consumption (see Table 4). One of the public indicators of the popularity of American junk foods is what has occurred with SPAM since it was popularized in the Philippines during World War II. More than 86 percent of a serving of this canned pork consists of fats and salt, and it contains no vitamins or micronutrients other than a trace of iron.⁴⁰ Manufactured in the Philippines, SPAM averaged about $3.50 per pound in mid-2009, making it more expensive than several high iron, non-processed seafoods and meats that are produced domestically. Despite its price, SPAM has been popularized by fast-food restaurants (Matejowsky 2007).

There are three other problems with Philippine import dependence. First, a high proportion of seafood imports are consumed by animals, as are about one-quarter of the cereals (Philippine Annual Fisheries Profile 2010). In 2016, per capita imports of fish feeds exceeded the per capita value of fish imported for human consumption (see Table 9). Second, nearly two-fifths of the country’s imports are processed meats, fish, cereals, vegetables and fruits, alcoholic and food additives that are too expensive to be incorporated into the food baskets of most Philippine households (see Table 6). In 2016, the Philippines expended nearly 81 percent of its import budget on foods high in sugars and fats, expending more on cocoa, coffee, tea, alcohol and beverages than on high-iron foods (see Table 6). Third, these imports clearly do not help to combat the country’s nutritional deficiencies, especially widespread shortfalls in iron, Vitamin A, and iodine (see Table 6).

The World Health Organization criticizes multinational corporations for marketing high fat, high sugar processed foods in food-deficit poor countries (Waxman 2003). Worldwide, fat consumption has increased nearly 20 percent since 1967, primarily due to higher intakes of processed foods in Asia. Health agencies in several Asian countries, including the Philippines, are alarmed by a growing “double burden” of malnutrition that includes (a) the predominant form of wasting/stunting associated with nutritional deficiencies caused by insufficient food intake and (b) a rising incidence of obesity linked to overeating of imported foods. Greater intakes of carbohydrates, fats and sugars are occurring among higher income groups who consume more expensive processed imports, so there is a growing incidence of over-nutrition and obesity in these households. In contrast, the poor are eating fewer calories, so their intake of protein-rich and iron-rich food has declined, often replaced by low-quality rice or cheap imported noodles. The average daily Filipino diet declined in quantity from 897 grams to 886 grams between 1978 and 2003, but the caloric intake rose from 1,804 to 1,905 calories, largely as a result of increased carbohydrate intake from processed foods. Despite the rising caloric intake, a majority of households have inadequate dietary energy levels. Since dietary intake from protein has shrunk to less than 12 percent, Filipinos acquire nearly 88 percent of their energy calories from unhealthy fats, sugars and carbohydrates. Only about 8 percent of the population reported sufficient levels of fruits and vegetables. Because of rising prices, fruit consumption has dropped 60 percent since 1978, causing low vitamin and other micronutrient shortfalls for most Filipinos. Similarly, the consumption of rice, starchy roots and tubers and fish has steadily declined.⁴¹ As a result of these food security problems, the Hunger Index for the Philippines is serious because 16 percent of the population is under-nourished and nearly 30 percent of young children are underweight (see Table 2). Moreover, two-thirds of Philippine children and two-fifths of women suffer from iron deficiency anemia (McLean et. al 2009). Such under-nutrition has life-long impacts on impoverished households because underweight babies stay small, and the final adult height is largely determined by nutrition before age two (Pedro et al. 2006).

2.4 Integration of Imported Processed Foods into Public Nutrition Policy

These disturbing trends result from lower consumption of the nutritionally-rich foods that are targeted for export, accompanied by a rise in household use of processed foods that are far less healthy. The country’s nutritional programs are exacerbating this trend through their focus on “fortified” processed foods and on “technological fixes” through imported supplements. Dietary changes toward processed foods are being stimulated and reinforced through nutritional standards that are employed by public health agencies and by school food programs.⁴² Based on a decade-long study of the negative effects of junk food on human health in the Philippines, the Tokyo Graduate School of Medicine has found that “poor people commonly believe that instant noodles fortified with Vitamin A and iron-supplemented canned sardines are healthier than vegetables. Perhaps this view is unsurprising considering that one of the government’s nutritional guidelines for Filipino children includes instant noodles. Moreover, multivitamin tablets are seen as prestigious while the consumption of tropical, indigenous, and cheap vegetables…are regarded as symbols of poverty” (Matejowsky 2007: 35). Nutribusiness is profitable in the global food system, and it consists in the marketing of “fortified” foods and nutritional supplements. However, it amounts to “profiteering in the name of nutrition” because it advocates consumption of imported artificial additives and expensive protein sources. As Omawale (1984: 178) observes, Asian public nutrition programs “are sources of direct profit for capitalists, such as those selling USAID commodities.”

Philippine government nutrition websites provide insight into the degree to which imported processed foods, including unhealthy ones, are prioritized as part of the country’s official strategy to combat malnutrition. The Food and Nutrition Research Institute (PFNRI) defines part of its mission to be the “development of technologies for the global and domestic markets,” reflecting the government’s focus on export. The PFNRI also offers a list of “commercializable food technologies” that focus on imported soy as the primary source of protein, in combination with rice and domestic foods, especially in baby foods. The “nutritionally adequate weekly menus” recommended by the PFNRI keep rice carbohydrates central to the diet, but fish and shellfish appear in only 6 meals out of 81 spread over a month. Almost every day, there are at least two recommended imported foods, most of which are too expensive to be afforded by the poor, including hot chocolate, orange juice, avocado, salmon chowder, beef and oatmeal.⁴³

The Philippine Nutrition Council (NNC) prioritizes “fortified foods” that result from “private sector, industry-led” development and promotion of processed foods.⁴⁴ In July 2009, the NNC offered a list of 281 foods that were awarded the government’s “Pinoy Seal of Approval” because companies claimed they were “fortified” with iron (83 items), Vitamin A (281 items) or iodine (9 items). Unlike the PFNRI menus, the NNC list includes few rice-based foods because the approved foods are disproportionately wheat and corn derivatives. Two-thirds of the items on the NNC list are either imported processed foods, or they require imported inputs, especially wheat. While the PFNRI weekly menus combine fresh and processed, domestic and imported foods, the NNC fortified list reflects no attempt to educate the public about sources of nutrients that occur naturally in foods produced domestically. Neither of these government nutrition websites informs the public (or the school and government personnel who implement these guidelines) that domestic cashews, mussels, oysters, shrimp, sardines and raw coconut meat are excellent natural sources of iron or that mango and tuna are the country’s best natural sources of Vitamin A. To undertake that public educational agenda would be to challenge the government’s focus on exporting those “high-value” foods.

What is most striking is that the NNC list of recommended “fortified” foods consists almost entirely of carbohydrates, many of which are heavy with transfats, saturated fats, and sugars. Fifty wheat flours, breads, crackers, and noodles appear on the list, reflecting high dependence on subsidized wheat imported primarily from the US. Even though these richer countries are marketing their products as part of this dubious list, American and European doctors and hospital nutritionists never integrate high carbohydrate snack foods, like the cheese spreads or deep fried chips on the NNC list, among healthy sources to acquire iron or vitamins. Any healthy effects from the added nutrients are offset by the transfats, sugars, high cholesterol and excessive calories. It is nonsensical to think that the added iron or Vitamin A is more significant than the connection between heart disease (a growing problem for Filipinos) and these types of carbohydrates and fats (Pedro et al. 2006). Fifteen items on the NCC list fortify corn products with iron, so the government program fails to educate the public that high consumption of corn causes the body not to absorb iron efficiently (FAO 1989b). The fortified list also integrates imported processed foods like instant drink mixes, dried french fries, mayonnaise, sandwich spreads, cake mixes, and hot dogs laden with carbohydrate fillers, none of which are recommended as healthy food choices by American and European medical personnel. The NCC’s questionable operational philosophy is that adding a micronutrient to a food makes it healthy, no matter how many carbohydrates, fats or sugars it contains. The not so hidden agenda of the NNC “fortified foods” list is to expand the market base for the approved products through the use of the “Pinoy seal” to encourage Filipinos to buy them. Indeed, eight companies supply 40 percent of the approved items on the NCC fortified list, and they each market 10 to 21 different foods with the advantage of the “Pinoy seal.”

Rather than educate the public about the nutritional value of natural fresh foods produced in the country, government policy focuses on artificial substitutions that will not compete with export goals. Let’s reflect on two examples. Iodine deficiency, the world’s number one cause of mental retardation, is such a significant problem in the Philippines that the government requires iodization of salt. Fish oil and palm oil have natural iodine, so these are the natural foods that would be readily available to Filipinos, if these resources were not being targeted for export and for biofuel production. Iodized salt is not a likely solution because the poor cannot always afford to purchase this commodity, especially the more expensive iodized form (FAO 2003a). Only 38 percent of households use iodized salt because it is more expensive, and it is unavailable in many rural areas.⁴⁵ Moreover, iodized salt becomes unstable in humid climates and loses nutritional value (Diosady and Manna 1997: 398). For a sizeable segment of the population, stunting and other illnesses derive from chronic energy deficiency that follows shortfalls of protein (fish being the most healthy source), natural starchy foods (such as cassava and rice), and healthy fats (like Omega 3 in fish). Obviously, the country produces sufficient amounts of several foods that could be utilized to attack micronutrient deficiencies. Greater accessibility, especially by inequitably impacted women and children, to the foods that the country exports could relieve these nutritional shortfalls in ways that processed substitutes do not. However, all the foods that are highest in iron, protein, Vitamin A and iodine are targeted for export. The Philippine government has established a clear public policy: “fortified” (but often unhealthy) processed foods and imported supplements for Filipinos, the most nutritious natural crops and seafoods for export.

2.5 Corporate Market Targeting of Philippine Children

In addition to these dangers of food importing, corporations aim many of their processed food campaigns at children, the age group that suffers the highest incidence of nutrient deficiencies. Food manufacturers and distributors are integrated into public school activities in ways that are intended to foster brand name recognition. A perusal of a newspaper’s weekly list of school sports competitions reveals a running list of corporate logos, like the Coca Cola Tigers and the Red Bull Barakos (Manila Standard, 30 May 2008). Moreover, the country’s school program for hungry children has been tainted with scandals about overpricing and substandard quality (Manila Times, 29 May 2009). Corporate promotion of baby food formulae and mixes has also been intense in the Philippines, as in several other Asian countries. Only 44 percent of Asian infants are exclusively breastfed for the first four months, a rate that is lower than breastfeeding in richer countries. Worldwide, 32 multinational corporations dominate the production and distribution of milk substitutes, but Nestles controls 40 percent of the world market in these commodities (MacDonald 2005: 122–24). Throughout the 1990s, the Asian marketing campaigns of infant formula manufacturers were aimed at convincing women and health personnel that bottle-feeding is the most nutritious method for infants. In rural areas, poor women purchased cheaper condensed milk products, thinking they were as nutritious as human breast milk (Kwiatkowski 1998: 49). The World Health Organization (1992) pointed to early weaning as a contributing factor in the stunting of young children, noting that breastfeeding “is less common in the Philippines than in other developing countries, with only about a third of all infants exclusively breastfed at ages younger than three months.” By age six months, less than 10 percent were exclusively breastfed. UNICEF (2003) reports that only 37 percent of Filipino babies are breastfed six months, so nearly 60 percent of infants aged six months to one year suffer from anemia. These breastfeeding trends had not changed by 2019.⁴⁶

The middle-class market potential for baby formula is highest in Asia, and this region accounts for nearly two-fifths of global sales of infant formula (Montlake 2005). Even though 16,000 infants die yearly because of problems related to formula, only about 35 percent of Asian women provide exclusive nursing to their infants for the first six months (Bakshian 2005). Because the Philippines is one of the largest markets for infant formula, corporations like Nestle, Abbot, Wyeth and Mead Johnson spend about $89 million annually on advertising to try to capture the $469 million market for breastmilk substitutes. That advertising has been highly effective, as the Philippines exhibits one of the lowest breastfeeding rates in Asia. Despite UNICEF service announcements over the last few years, infant milk formula is one of the top three consumer products in the country (New York Times, 17 July 2007). Nurjana Dones, jobless wife of a Manila warehouse laborer, reports that pregnant women and mothers are bombarded with television ads, posters in medical clinics, and advice from health personnel to utilize infant and baby formulae. She complains that the Philippines is “a poor country where many families cannot afford a decent meal on a daily basis and yet spend [$37] monthly on formula milk– milk whose benefits don’t even come close to the benefits of mother’s milk, which is free” (Conde 2007). The early advice of health workers can be strategic. “Giving free samples of milk substitutes to new mothers represents a particularly insidious way of promoting formula, because even a few days of infant formula…makes a baby fussy about taking the breast. The mother’s lactation will naturally have become reduced through the lack of stimulation and may not be capable of increasing again. In this way, the mother is then forced to feed and buy formula when the free supplies cease, a great cost to the baby, its family, and the state in both health and economic terms” (MacDonald 2005: 125).

To encourage breastfeeding, the Philippine government enacted a 1986 Milk Code that bans advertisements and other promotional activities for formula intended for babies younger than one year. Convinced that companies had been violating marketing regulations, the Philippine Health Department revised the code in 2006, extending the advertising and promotion bans to cover milk substitutes for children up to two years of age. For that reason, the Philippines emerged as a test case for the worldwide campaign of the World Health Organization and UNICEF to increase breastfeeding levels in poor countries. Health Department officials and UNICEF representatives argued that companies influenced mothers most through health clinics and personnel who offered them samples of infant formula (Bakshian 2005). With strong backing from the US Chamber of Commerce, companies successfully secured a restraining order to delay the code revision while a court case was heard. In subsequent months, the companies undertook a massive lobbying effort to try to convince the government that its international trade reputation would be damaged by implementation of the revised Milk Code (Raya 2008). The case was surrounded by a lot of controversy, including the assassination of a Health Department attorney and the attempted killing of a UNICEF lawyer (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 18 June 2007). In October 2007, the Philippine Supreme Court ruled that the Milk Code revisions are not “illegal restraint of trade” and broadened regulation of advertising and promotion to cover children older than one year (Keep Abreast, 11 October 2007).⁴⁷

Promotion of cold cereal, served with milk, is another imported food agenda that is primarily aimed at children. Worldwide, four corporations dominate cereals, with Kellogg as the leader. In the Philippines, the processed cereal industry is controlled by three companies that are connected to multinational conglomerates Nestle/General Mills (70 percent of sales) and Kellogg. Alaska Milk, one of two major dairy distributors in the country, combines marketing of its fresh, canned and powdered milk products with imported Kellogg cereals, and it maintains a school campaign that markets the idea that “Healthy Breakfast equals Cereals + Milk.” Heavily dependent on imported processed foods and inputs, the cold cereal industry markets commodities that are affordable only to the middle and elite classes (Ching 2008: 8). Moreover, two-thirds of the country’s supply of milk for such cereal products is imported.⁴⁸

5.1 Future Export and Nonfood Strategies

The Mid-term Development Plan (Republic of Philippines 2000) offers no evidence that the country will stop prioritizing exports and nonfoods over domestic consumption. In 2009, a Philippine economist naively contended that the country should “look beyond” domestic food crops that are “not our comparative advantage. Importation is not that bad” (Philippine Business Mirror, 8 June 2009). On the one hand, this economist has not noticed that the Philippines holds no regional or global “comparative advantage” in any of the agricultural or fishery commodities that it exports, as indicated by intense regional competition, declining prices and the country’s falling global standing among the world’s export fisheries. “Despite declining competitiveness of the country’s leading export crops, the government continues to blindly promote export crop production” (Pascual and Glipo 2002: 7). On the other hand, this economist is dismissing the health threats that are deriving from globalization of unhealthy western diets, as analyzed by Philippine National Nutritional Surveys, the World Health Organization, and several NGO s.⁶² However, the government’s export targets are in accord with this outdated thinking, and the policies of the Department of Agriculture do not reflect recognition of the dangers associated with ignoring domestic food security. Instead, the Philippine government continues to prioritize expansion of aquaculture, a limited array of cash crops and nonfood land uses. The Philippine government is committed to the opening of more than 13.5 million hectares of new lands in the early 21st century (see Table 12), but less than 7 percent of these new lands will target production for local consumption. Only 9 percent of these lands are allocated to expanded export food production while the rest will be used to expand nonfood exports, including 62 percent of land use for timbering and other nonfood purposes, 15 percent for biofuels, 10.4 percent for cultivation of nonfood crops, and 2 percent for production of animal and fish feeds. Most of these new lands will derive from privatization of public grasslands and mangroves, as well as the dispossession of indigenous peoples from their ancestral lands. Reallocation of public commons and indigenous lands will remove from domestic consumption all the food gathering and cultivation that occurs there. Nearly 9 percent of these new land uses will result from reallocation of existing lands that produce crops for domestic consumption. Since the legislation specifies the origins of only 77 percent of the new hectares, it is likely that more current food-producing areas will be directed to nonfood uses.

Even though the Food and Agriculture Organization (2008b) warns that biofuels pose a threat to the world food supply, the Philippine government hopes to export greater amounts of the country’s future corn, sugar, cassava, seaweed, coconut oil, palm oil, and smaller fish for this purpose. At his 2009 public briefing for foreign investors, the Philippine Secretary of Agriculture announced that the government has set the goal of expanding agricultural crops that can meet the demand for biofuels. By 2015, he claims, the Philippines will export increased levels of corn, 10.3 million tons of sugarcane, 14.4 million tons sorghum, and 4 million tons of cassava for this industrial purpose. He also expects the demand for the country’s coconut oil to increase, as richer countries begin to use it as a biofuel (Fresh Plaza, 8 June 2009). Fish oil is also being employed as a biofuel in some countries (FAO 2008b), so this new form of nonfood consumption is likely to drain away even more of the country’s smaller fish that are important food sources for the poor. In 2004, biofuel crops were being grown on about one percent of the world’s arable lands (ESCAP 2010), but the Philippines is targeting a higher proportion of its future farmlands for cultivation of crops that will generate methanol for export (see Table 12).

These export agendas are not likely to generate any greater economic growth or improvement in quality of life than they have in the past. The Philippines has been a net importer of agricultural products since 1994, and there is little probability this trend will change. In its Medium-Term Development Plan, the government admits that economic growth rates in agriculture have not kept “apace with those of its neighbors,” and that export agriculture “has had a very limited impact, so far, in reducing rural unemployment, underemployment and poverty,” which is severe at 4 million unemployed and underemployed (Republic of Philippines 2000: 24–26, 29). Despite its recognition of economic, social, political, and ecological problems that have resulted from the country’s export strategies, the Plan sets new goals that gamble the country’s food supply on the irrational dream of capturing foreign exchange that has not materialized in past years. This development agenda is grounded in ideological commitment to traditional notions of comparative advantage, but the achievement of specialized commodity niches has eluded the country for decades. Politicians and economists are quick to point the finger of blame at population growth, making inaccurate claims that human numbers have outstripped the capacity of the country to feeds its people. As we have shown, analysis of official government data belies such Malthusian rhetoric. Indeed, the Philippines has not emphasized the production of rice or any other agricultural or fishery crop for domestic consumption. Instead, the government and many Philippine economists prioritize redirection of scarce resources into commodities that are in demand in world markets, in order to produce exports that will earn foreign exchange to repay external debts and to purchase food imports. Even though this approach has failed the Philippines miserably, these export priorities have been concretized into 21st century national development policy (Republic of the Philippines 2000).

5.2 The Risk of Food Import Dependency

Every year since 1994, the Philippines had a trade imbalance, even in years when it has exhibited economic growth.⁶³ Between 1982 and 2003, the country experienced surges in 120 food imports that negatively impacted domestic agricultural and fishery production (ESCAP 2010: 49). In 2008, the value of exports was 3.6 times 1994 levels, but the county had a 15.6 percent trade deficit, and its external debt was equivalent to 65 percent of GDP. The country’s agricultural track record over this period is even worse. In 2008, the Philippines exported commodities valued at 3.3 times the 1994 agricultural exports, but it still showed an 80.2 percent trade deficit. Despite the government’s commitment to diversion of farm lands to export “high-value” export crops, the Philippines has experienced higher trade deficits in agricultural commodities than in other sectors. The trends with respect to food are even more grim. In 1994, the country’s only trade surplus occurred in food exports. By 2008, the country’s food exports were valued at 4.3 times the 1994 level, but the value of imported foods exceeded the value of “high value” food and fish exports. By 2016, the Philippines was expending far more on food imports than it earned on its nonfood exports that utilized thousands more hectares than crops for domestic consumption.⁶⁴

In a shocking manner, 2008 proved to be a significant test year for the country’s economic ideology. Due to several global circumstances, grain prices rose sharply, so cereals were the fourth most expensive Philippine import.⁶⁵ The government’s economic ideology does not take into account two significant dangers associated with its export goals. First, the country cannot naively assume that it will be able to buy in the world market the foods it needs– even if it acquires enough foreign exchange to break even on such purchases. The 2008 global crisis underlines an obvious flaw in reliance on food imports. Countries can and do stop producing and exporting commodities, as occurred during the 2020 COVID pandemic (see Chapter 7). Only about 5 to 7 percent of total rice production enters the global market in a high production year (Harden 2008), and countries restrict export of this grain in low-supply years (FAO 2008a: 4–5). Among Asian and Pacific countries, 25 are rice importers while only 12 are exporters. After India and Vietnam tightened export restrictions in early 2008, the price of rice increased 184 percent. Even after price declines as more rice entered world markets, rice cost twice as much in September 2008 as it had in November 2007 (ESCAP 2010: 44, 78). Moreover, worldwide trends show a shift toward greater production of other grains, with the probable outcome that there will be less available rice in the future (Chand 2008). Second, the government’s future agriculture targets are not grounded in a realistic assessment of the risks and costs of being oil-dependent. Philippine agricultural goals require that exports be transported great distances inside the country, and hybridized agricultural intensification requires petroleum-based imports that continue to escalate in price. In 2008, the world’s attention was upon the Philippine need to import rice that was in short supply in the world market. However, that was not the commodity that absorbed most of the funds expended on imports at the peak of this global grain crisis. Rather 24 percent of the cost of the country’s imports lay in petroleum, mineral fuels, and petroleum-based chemicals while less than 5 percent of import expense was caused by rice. The country expended $5.25 on mineral fuels and petroleum-based agricultural chemicals to every dollar it spent for rice to be eaten by its people.⁶⁶

5.3 Ecological Degradation and Food Security

Has the Philippine government set goals to alleviate the types of ecological degradation that threaten future food security? As reflected in its Mid-term Development Plan, the Philippine government is quite aware that its past export strategies have resulted in land conversions from rice and foods for local consumption, widespread soil erosion, loss of irrigated farmlands, extreme stress on fisheries and coastal areas, loss of 66 percent of forests and severe ecological impacts from mining. Moreover, Philippine biodiversity is “considered to be among the most threatened in the world.” As a result of past ecological exploitation, nearly half of all agricultural lands are moderately to severely eroded, and numerous plant and fish/shellfish/crustacean species are at risk of extinction. “Widespread loss of mangroves, living corals and sea grasses has severely eroded the capacity” of the coastal and marine ecosystems “to support life.” The country’s watersheds and bays have been severely degraded, and six river systems are biologically dead (Republic of Philippines 2000: 14–30). Suh and Pomeroy (2012: 12) estimate that future climate change will cause a 9 to 18 percent decline in Philippine GDP and a 4 percent decrease in household income. Chapter 7 provides more in-depth analysis of climate change.

Has the government set goals to alleviate such ecological degradation? Quite the contrary, the development plan focuses on overcoming “the underutilization of the country’s abundant natural resources.” Consequently, the plan sets early 21st century goals that ignore environmental degradation and intensify past patterns of exploitation of ecosystems. In order to “create a climate conducive for investments and production,” the government seeks to “identify idle resources” and to “manage them more efficiently” as part of a “market-driven strategy” that will “maximize exports and investment opportunities offered by trade agreements” (Republic of Philippines 2000: 17–18, 43–54). The Philippine state intends to:

1. accelerate privatization of public lands;

2. promote more leasing of mangroves for aquaculture expansion;

3. open 8.4 million hectares of public forests to timbering and other private development;

4. develop 2 million hectares of new land for large agribusinesses that employ contract farming;

5. utilize more “idle off-shore and inland bodies of water for aquaculture;”

6. move further away from crop and species diversity toward deeper monocultural agriculture and fisheries that are organized around “One Town One Product” specializations;

7. make “underutilized farmlands” more productive through “increased cropping intensity” and wider use of genetically-modified species, fertilizers and pesticides;⁶⁷

8. and expand mining through a “National Mineral Action Plan” because “94.4% of mineralized areas have yet to be developed.”

5.4 Outlook for Future Food Security

Is the outlook for the country’s food security likely to improve in the early 21st century? In reality, the country is moving further toward food insecurity. The Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (2010: 8, 40, 59–72) pinpoints five elements of Philippine future development goals that will exacerbate unsustainable agriculture and food insecurity: (1) dependence on genetically-modified crops and imported agricultural inputs, (2) privatization of public lands, (3) depeasantization. (4) shrinking forests, and (5) biofuel production. Moreover, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences warns that new aquaculture technologies “are unlikely to lead to a sustainable industry” (Lebel et al. 2002: 311). Because of the growing organized political opposition to aquaculture in the US, Canada and Europe, these richer countries will increasingly externalize the ecological costs of fish farming to Asian countries (Platon and Israel 2001: 12).⁶⁸ Even though nutritional deficiencies are exacerbated by food exporting, the country ships out a significant proportion of its most nutritious crops and fishery resources and displaces traditional food staples. Despite the country’s widespread protein and iron deficiencies, the country sells internationally near one-quarter of dressed chickens, nearly one-fifth of finfish, as much as one-half of shellfish and crustaceans, and a high proportion of the small fishes that are used to generate fish oil abroad. The best foods to overcome pervasive vitamin and energy shortfalls leave the Philippines for distant world markets, including half the banana production, nearly one-fifth of other fruits, more than 11 percent of vegetables, and a majority of the oils that could be used for cooking. Even part of the rice output is exported, mostly concealed in processed cereal preparations.⁶⁹

More than 90 percent of new land use creation is targeted for nonfood uses and exports (see Table 12). Thus the country’s 2000 development plan ignores production for local consumption while setting goals in such a way that traditional staple foods will continue to be threatened and displaced (Republic of Philippines 2000). In fact, the plan not only allocates most of its newly created croplands to nonfoods, but it also targets restructuring of existing lands and fishponds and the privatization of forests, mangroves and indigenous ancestral lands that have provided foods for local consumption. Even though agricultural and fishery outputs have increased, food insecurity has worsened since 2000. Philippine food shortfalls have been severe enough that the country averages annual international food aid of 110,204 metric tons. Furthermore, the United Nations began to rank the Philippines as one of the world’s “hunger and food insecurity hotspots” in 2009 (ESCAP 2010: 29, 66).

As poverty deepened between 2013 and 2015, nearly two-fifths of families lived in substandard housing, 1.2 million households lacked access to safe water, 1.8 million households had no sanitary toilets, and less than 5 percent of the population was served by sewerage systems. Between 2010 and 2015, malnutrition worsened, and more than two-thirds of households exhibited per capita micronutrient intakes that fell below daily requirements. Moreover, the proportions of underweight, stunted and wasted children increased. One of every three children (3.8 million) was stunted, but stunting was much worse among poor and rural households. The incidence of stunting was 3.3 times greater among the poor than among the wealthiest households (PNAPC 2017: 15–16). In 2015, only 31 percent of households were meeting recommended protein intake, and more than one-fifth of children were Vitamin A deficient. In 2019 and 2020, the country’s national nutrition survey reported that two-thirds of households suffered moderate to severe food insecurity. Nearly 42 percent of these households had no money to buy food, and one-fifth of adults decreased their own intake in order to feed children. Feeding programs specific to children declined sharply, and the government-sponsored micronutrient powder was made available to less than 11 percent of children younger than five. Breastfeeding rose to 60 percent of infants, and nearly one-third of mothers indicated that their children older than five had lost weight. Only one-fifth of pregnant women received minimum acceptable diets in terms of dietary diversity and daily feedings.⁷⁰ For all these reasons, the Global Hunger Index (Concern Worldwide 2010–2019) for the Philippines has remained “serious” since 2010, with no signs of government commitment to effect future long-term policy changes.