1.1 Declining Cultivation of Cereals

Food crops for local consumption have been marginalized and devalued by Philippine development goals, and the export goals exceeded the available land along Panguil Bay. As a result, these national agendas spurred legal and illegal conversions of food crop lands. Nationally between 1995 and 2007, there was an 8.5 percent increase in croplands, but the Panguil Bay area lost more than 14 percent. The number of regional farms decreased by nearly 3 percent, and the average size of farms diminished to 2.7 hectares (NSO 2004). Most of those regional cropland losses occurred in cultivation of rice, causing higher rice shortfalls per capita than is true for the country as a whole. Nationally between 1995 and 2009, ricelands increased by nearly 21 percent, but Panguil Bay provinces were committing 9 percent fewer hectares to rice cultivation by 2009. Even though Misamis Occidental farmers cultivate vast highly-visible tracts of rice, this province commits only 12 percent of its cropland to grains. In the two municipalities of Aurora and Tambulig, there is only about 0.3 hectare of rice to every hectare of bananas and coconuts. Because of land conversions and ecological degradation since 1990, this region has been transformed from rice self-sufficiency to a zone that is dependent on rice imports.⁴

Panguil Bay provinces suffer more limited access to dietary grains than does the rest of the country. Since 1995, the Philippines has employed hybrid seed varieties on fewer hectares to generate a 21 percent increase in rice production. Over the same period, Panguil Bay rice production declined 2 percent. On the one hand, regional provinces have not benefitted equitably from the national irrigation program. Regional irrigated farm area declined 22.4 percent between 1990 and 2008, so only about 13 percent of regional farms were irrigated (NSO 2004).⁵ On the other hand, many rice farmers are too poor to afford the higher-yield hybrid rice seeds and chemical inputs that must be utilized if farmers are to be eligible for government subsidizes and credit (Interviews).

Similar declines have occurred in corn, the primary grain consumed by one-third of Bay households. Nationwide, corn lands declined very little between 1995 and 2009, but Panguil Bay corn hectares diminished by nearly 15 percent. While national corn production expanded 70 percent, regional output increased only 7.5 percent. Nationally, land use for grains increased more than 10 percent between 1995 and 2009, accompanied by a 62 percent rise in production. In contrast, Panguil Bay provinces lost nearly 11 percent of their grain lands, so the region exhibited less than a 3 percent increase in outputs. Local officials and NGO staff reported that some corn hectares were converted to fishponds in the 1990s. Moreover, the tradition of planting corn beneath coconut trees has been increasingly abandoned. Despite these trends, Panguil Bay provinces export grains through regional brokers. Nationally, the value of 2009 exported cereals and cereal preparations was five times greater than the 1995 level, driving the transfer of grains to Manila for processing and re-export. Throughout northern Mindanao, most of the rice is “sold through middlemen without a fixed price. A large quantity of rice production is transported outside the region through several middlemen who purchase the product at farmgate prices. Only a few farmers sell their produce to the National Food Authority (PDA 2009b: 2).”⁶

1.2 Prioritizing Commercial Export Crops

National policymakers prioritize an “agribusiness approach to countryside development” that values larger farms over small producers. Following the export principle that “high-value farm crops, vegetables and fruits have higher income potential than the traditional staple crops of rice and corn,” the Philippine plan (Republic of Philippines 2000: 29–34) sets goals that ignore peasants, including:

1. “pursuit of a market-driven strategy that will link supply capacity closer to the high-impact markets,”

2. promotion of national and foreign investments in agribusiness approaches and in infrastructure to support exporting,

3. “a large-scale program of non-traditional high-value crops in farms and fisheries,”

4. “increased production intensity” in existing crop, livestock and fishpond hectares,

5. reconfiguration of “existing agricultural and fishery production systems to be able to tap emerging markets with vast potentials,”

6. “value-adding through innovative packaging and agri-processing technologies” (e.g., freezing, cold storage, canning, drying), and

7. cultivation of “idle and marginal lands” (i.e., mangroves) with export fruit trees.

The government makes its intentions clear: its goal is to “transform farmlands into agribusiness enterprises.” As for the people, “all these initiatives will result in the creation of a new class of farmers and fishers” who increase and diversify the marketable surpluses of their farms.⁷ In short, this is a plan to depeasantize the country’s agriculture, to concentrate most of the production into the hands of fewer larger holdings and to rationalize the labor process through greater reliance on modern technologies and imported artificial inputs. In this plan, the policymakers target “unsustainable practices” of impoverished peasant farmers, ignoring the massive levels of degradation that result from the country’s largest farms and tree plantations. Since Mindanao was targeted to be “an agribusiness hub,” Panguil Bay farmers have been harshly impacted.

Between 2008 and 2019, the country allocated more than one-third of croplands to rice. In the Panguil Bay region, however, rice is cultivated on less than 15 percent of all farm land. In sharp contrast to national trends, there is only one hectare of rice to every 5.6 hectares of crops that are not used for local consumption. Following development recommendations from the World Bank and IMF, the Philippines moved toward designating “high value export crops” and toward generating the resources needed to sustain that export-led agenda. Through subsidies, research and public advocacy, the government prioritizes commodities that it claims will generate the greatest foreign exchange or provision growth in other export sectors. In 2009, nearly half of all the country’s croplands were devoted to nonfood and export crops, but the impacts were worse in the Panguil Bay area. Nationally, more than 46 percent of agricultural land was being utilized for domestic crops, but only 24 percent of Panguil Bay agricultural land was growing domestic foods.⁸

In 2009, Mindanao was again targeted for an intense phase of agro-industrial development (Mindanao Magazine, 20 January 2009). A high proportion of the crops that the government targeted for expansion for export were produced in Mindanao (Menguita-Feranil 2007: 4). More than 43 percent of the country’s farms are situated in Mindanao, producing 87 percent of the country’s pineapples, 77 percent of bananas, 58 percent of coconuts, and 56 percent of corn. For that reason, the government earmarked $19.1 billion for agribusiness infrastructure and the expansion of “high-value” export cash crops in this region between 2007 and 2010 (Minda News, 17 June 2009). Regionally, 72 percent of farm hectares cultivated nonfood crops to generate exports and to provide feeds for the burgeoning meat, chicken and aquaculture industries.⁹

In Panguil Bay communities, coconuts are planted on nearly three times as many hectares as rice and on 1.7 times as many hectares as all crops for human consumption. Because coconut oil is one of the country’s most valuable industrial exports, nearly 86 percent of coconuts are utilized for nonfood purposes. Corn is also disappearing from the human diet due to the convergence of two trends: the decline in corn hectares since 1995 and increased nonfood usage. Several mills along Panguil Bay process corn into livestock and aquaculture feeds, leaving less than 18 percent for human consumption. Cassava is another traditional food that has been redirected outside the human diet. The vast majority of this crop is exported for industrial uses, but the government has also targeted this crop for future biofuel production. As a result, less than 10 percent of cassava was available for human consumption in 2010. In addition, the region cultivates abaca (hemp), rubber, and tobacco. Because it is indigenous, the Philippines produces 84 percent of the world’s abaca for industrial purposes.¹⁰ In 2001, the Philippine government set national biofuel goals for expansion of palm oil tree plantations.¹¹ By 2006, the government was exploring the processing of corn, rice and sorghum hybrids into ethanol (Borras et. al. 2007: 1560). In 2019, one of every eighteen hectares, nearly 6 percent of the country’s agricultural land, was being used to grow oil palm and other biofuel crops.¹² In addition, ornamental crops emerged in the region, as evidenced by a large flower farm we photographed near Tangub City.

By 2009, less than one-quarter of regional farmlands were being used to cultivate crops primarily for human consumption (see Table 13). Instead, Panguil Bay produced a disproportionate share of nonfood crops that fuel the country’s pursuit of exports. Between 1995 and 2009, regional production of coconuts and cassava doubled while increasing only about 15 percent nationally. In addition to nonfoods, Panguil Bay communities allocate four percent of hectares to the cultivation of the government’s targeted fruit and vegetable exports. In 2008, this region exported nearly 20 percent of fruits other than bananas, and almost 13 percent of vegetables, cashews and peanuts. Indeed, Panguil Bay provinces were more deeply embedded in this long-term export agenda than the country as a whole. Nationally between 1995 and 2009, fruits targeted for export increased less than seven percent while Panguil Bay fruit outputs nearly tripled. In 2009, fruits were being cultivated on more regional hectares than any other targeted food export, primarily reflecting the external marketing of nearly 60 percent of banana production. Similarly, Panguil Bay export vegetable production tripled over this period while national outputs climbed only half that much. Even though nuts targeted for export declined 24 percent nationally over this period, the output of cashews and peanuts doubled along Panguil Bay.

Panguil Bay was also nationally targeted for increased beef, pork and chicken production (Republic of Philippines 2000), and it is in this sector that regional agriculture exhibited the greatest transformation. Because regional pork is primarily consumed locally, processed hogs declined 17 percent. In contrast, processed poultry rose more than 35 percent because the country exported nearly one-quarter of its dressed chickens. By 2010, poultry production accounted for 15 percent of the total value of the country’s agricultural exports, and quail raising for export increased four-fold. Between 1990 and 2009, Panguil Bay chicken processing increased nine fold, but this regional expansion was five times greater than the national level. Most of the expansion in this sector results from regional contract farming with two multinational corporations. There were 63 commercially processed chickens to every head of cattle, and 32 chickens to every hog being grown on Panguil Bay farms (NSO 2004). These trends reflect loss of available local food sources, as the traditional pattern has been for farms to grow small numbers of hogs and chickens for household consumption. Reflecting government export agendas, chicken processing increased four times more than fruits and vegetables that have been targeted for export.¹³

2.1 Traditional Peasant Capture Fishing

Capture fishing is undertaken by three categories of independent operators. About 29 percent are middle class peasants who rely on traders and wholesalers to finance more exploitative gears that generate daily fishing incomes of $3 to $5. Another 1.5 percent of the region’s fishers use large commercial vessels and ply both municipal and ocean waters. However, 69.5 percent of capture fishers are poor peasants who generate daily per capita incomes of less than $1.00 (see Figure 13). At this point, it is important to emphasize that Philippine peasant fishers mirror global trends. Worldwide, 5.8 million fishers earn less than $1.00 daily, but the vast majority of these households are concentrated in Asia (World Bank 2012). Historically, Panguil Bay has been home to peasant fishers who rely on small non-motorized boats and simple net technologies that can be cast by a small group or attached to the cross bars on their canoes. Traditionally, capture fishing in the coastal waters and crustacean gathering in the mangroves have been the major sources of livelihood for peasant fisher households (interviews). Until 1980, peasant fishers produced a majority of the fish, shellfish and crustaceans consumed locally. As late as 1988, they captured more than 70 percent of the region’s seafoods. By 2000, commercial fishers in large vessels were dominating production by capturing 45 percent of fish. By 2007, the share of regional fish production caught by peasant fishers had shrunk to about one-fifth. Over this period, the government prioritized the exploitation of Panguil Bay by commercial fishers. Development philosophy has advocated restriction of peasant access to Bay resources in order to make way for strategies that effect higher mass productivity and increased export value.¹⁵ However, this public agenda does not reflect the realities of the lives of a majority of the peasant population who have few assets and even fewer few livelihood options.

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Panguil Bay fishers and fishing, 2019

SOURCE: PHILIPPINE ANNUAL FISHERIES PROFILES (AVERAGES FOR 2010 TO 2019)

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In 1969, small capture fishers averaged twelve kilograms daily using traditional technologies. During the 1970s and early 1980s, a peasant fisher could make a good catch of finfish in less than two hours and net a few crabs. In 1992, peasant fishers captured 1.3 tons to every ton extracted by commercial vessels. By 2000, the marketable species in Panguil Bay had declined nearly 30 percent, but most peasant fishers could not compete with the larger commercial vessels that needed to go deeper into the ocean to catch them. At that time, more than half the fish captured from Panguil Bay had lower market value, and the average daily peasant catch dwindled to less than a kilogram by 2008. Fishers complain that fishing and crab gathering are almost dead because of the decline in marine species. Since 2000, a fisher feels lucky to catch a kilogram of finfish per day and only rarely catches one or two crab that are much smaller than those caught two decades ago.¹⁶ On average, peasant fishers market daily only 36 to 91 US cents worth of fish, so most of them fall below the World Bank demarcation for absolute poverty. The species that is most significant among captured seafood exports is tuna which is predominantly harvested by commercial operators. Between 1992 and 2008, the Philippines tripled its tuna production, and Panguil Bay area commercial fishers generated one-third of that output. In 2007, tuna accounted for nearly 11 percent of total municipal fish production and more than 34 percent of commercial production in Bay communities. The Panguil Bay area accounted for 17 percent of national production, and tuna accounted for 20 percent of the value of all regional fishery exports.¹⁷

2.2 Depeasantization of Capture Fishing

By 1995, national fishery goals had changed dramatically, spurring the use of larger exploitative technologies by the small number of commercial fishers. In 2007 along Panguil Bay, 136 commercial operators harvested two-thirds of the captured fish while more than 15,000 peasant fishers generated the rest. Small and mid-size boats in municipal waters averaged about four kilograms daily while commercial vessels averaged 333 kilograms (BFAR 2007). While peasant fishers average daily catches of about three-quarters kilogram, more affluent fishers employ exploitative technologies to acquire commercial-level catches. Financed by regional wholesalers or absentee investors, these fishers install large stationary nets in Panguil Bay or operate small commercial boats on shares (Interviews). By 2008, peasant fishing was marginalized from natural resources by capital-intensive commercial capture fishing and aquaculture. Since a majority of Panguil Bay fishers do not own much equipment, the largest catches are controlled by the minority who utilize exploitative equipment. Even simple technologies are not very widespread among fishers. The bamboo crab pot outnumbers any other mechanism, but only about one-third of fishers own them. Motorized boats can double the fisher’s daily capture through the use of more complex gears, but only about one-fifth can afford them (or the diesel fuel). The crab lift net, the bottom set long line and the bottom set gill net are owned by 11 to 29 percent of fishers. Large stationary high-catch nets (i.e., bungsod, fish tower, and sangaab) are operated only by 1 to 4 percent of fishers who are financed by traders. The scoop net captures the largest daily catch, but it is owned by only 0.2 percent of fishers.¹⁸ Such mass production strategies generate three-quarters of the regional production, and a high proportion of those seafoods is being exported. Higher-value species comprise 80 percent of the fish captured by commercial fishers while three-fifths of the catch of peasant fishers consists of lower-value smaller species that will be consumed locally (BFAR 2008).

Because they are permanently installed over larger areas of the Bay, trader-financed stationary nets average daily catches that are two to eight times greater than those attained by peasant fishers with simpler equipment. Annually, a bungsod can capture twice as much as the typical production of one peasant who uses simpler technologies. Between 2005 and 2015, there were at least 648 bungsods permanently stationed in Panguil Bay, each averaging annual catches of 1.5 metric tons. Combined these nets hauled out nearly 1,400 metric tons, an amount of fish that would have required nearly 1,300 peasant fishers to capture (see Figure 14). Each year, a fish tower ensnares three times more seafood than a productive peasant boat owner. There were 141 giant fish towers permanently installed in Panguil Bay, each averaging an annual catch of more than 2.6 metric tons. There were also 543 massive sangaabs, each averaging an annual catch of nearly 2.7 metric tons. Nearly 2,000 peasants struggled to catch as much as these two types of technology withdrew from the Bay’s resources.¹⁹

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Average annual metric tons captured by peasants and illegal stationary gears along Panguil Bay, 2005–2015

SOURCE: PHILIPPINE ANNUAL FISHERIES PROFILE (AVERAGES OF 2005 TO 2015)

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Local and national attempts to ban these stationary nets from Panguil Bay have been unsuccessful. For a five year period in the 1980s, Panguil Bay was closed to several intensive gears, including sangaab, bungsod, crab lift net, gill net, cast net, and troll line (Dickinson 1987: 226–27). The ban proved ineffective, as it excluded any fisher who used a boat weighing less than three tons. An FAO report described the banning as an assault on “external intruders,” indicating that most exploitative gears were financed by external commercial operations (Baland and Platteau 1996: 14). In 1990, officials destroyed 1,600 net systems and uprooted several hundred net posts in the Bay. However, the gears appeared again almost immediately, and there has been no subsequent political will to eliminate them. As a result, there are nearly the same number of the most exploitative gears on Panguil Bay as there were in the 1980s. In 2005, there were nearly 1,400 stationary netting systems installed in Panguil Bay (MSU Naawan Foundation 2006). Combined, these exploitative gears withdrew 4,086 metric tons from the Bay, an amount that requires nearly 5,500 peasant fishers to capture with simpler technologies.

Illegal gears that were prohibited a decade ago are still operated all over Panguil Bay, both openly and covertly.²⁰ In our interviews and those conducted by MSU Naawan Foundation (2006), peasant fishers indicated that exploitative gears were a primary cause of fishery depletion and, therefore, a threat to their livelihoods. Because these stationary gears require high capital investment, peasant fishers point out that they are not enterprises of the poor. Interviewed fishers reported that construction of illegal sangaabs and fish towers are “usually financed and their operations controlled by capitalists who are fish traders, fish processors and exporters. … The capitalists are considered so influential, financially and politically, that it would require a strong political will to dismantle the illegal structures that dominate Panguil Bay’s seascape” (MSU Naawan Foundation 2006: 185–86). National policy labels them “passive fishing gears” that are “viable alternatives to fish hunting in the wild,” ignoring that these technologies exploit far more resources than traditional methods. Couching these gears as “nondestructive,” BFAR officials conduct training sessions and distribute this equipment to Panguil Bay fishers who can finance them (Philippine Star, 13 June 2010).

3.1 National Trade Crisis and Regional Expansion of the 1990s

When the country caught “shrimp fever” in the 1980s, most Panguil Bay communities did not. A majority of regional fishponds continued to specialize in milkfish for local consumption until the early 1990s.²² After the national crisis of the late 1980s and early 1990s in shrimp exporting, the country began targeting virgin territories of northern Mindanao for expansion of this commodity (Republic of Philippines 1992: 34). By 1995, nearly 13 percent of the country’s fishponds were operating in this region. Despite its small coastal water area, Panguil Bay ranked 28th in the country in its aquaculture outputs during the 1990s.²³ As regional outputs of export shrimp rose sharply, milkfish production for domestic consumption dropped. Between 1998 and 2003, Panguil Bay was nationally targeted for increased fish farming of tilapia and milkfish and for intensification of seaweed farming. Some abandoned shrimp ponds were converted to milkfish production, and export seaweed production was intensified (JEP-ATRE 2004). Until the late 1990s, aquaculture production rose slowly and gradually along Panguil Bay, but the so-called rehabilitation efforts of the late 1990s stimulated even greater exploitation of regional resources (Roxas et al. 2009). By 1995, fishpond development had expanded to 28,250 fishpond hectares that consumed 14 times more land area than 1951 aquaculture. Regional fish and shellfish production in ponds began to rise sharply in the late 1990s, and aquaculture production has continued unabated since then.²⁴

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Exploitative fish harvest technologies. The top diagram shows a sangaab, the net system that produces the most massive catches from incoming tide waters; there were 543 of these installed in Panguil Bay in 2014. The bottom photo shows one of the 648 bungsods, most of which are managed by middle-sector peasant fishers who are in debt bondage to traders or financiers. These expensive technologies average annual harvests that are four to eight times greater than those attained by the most productive peasant fishers using traditional gears

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3.2 Aggressive Aquaculture Promotion Since 2000

In line with the development thinking of external funding agencies that vast areas of the Philippines “are still under-utilised with respect to aquaculture” (FAO 2004b: 3), the country’s early 21st century fishery policy advocates “aggressive promotion in all regions” of export-oriented aquaculture (Mulekom et al. 2006: 552), especially in Mindanao. Because 43 percent of the country’s aquaculture production occurs there (Menguita-Feranil 2007: 3), government funds were earmarked for “realizing Mindanao’s agribusiness and aquaculture and mariculture potentials” (Republic of Philippines 2000: 59). Mindanao was expected to triple exports of aquaculture products to China quickly.²⁵ The Philippine Chamber of Commerce advocates that “aquaculture production in Mindanao offers opportunities for growth, with a variety of species available. Mindanao is an ideal location…due to its large production areas and year-round fish production” (PIA News, 17 September 2008). The President of Cruz Aquaculture repeated this position when he told the Sixth Mindanao Food Congress that “Mindanao can increase its aquaculture production and can compete with other Southeast Asian countries. … We can have better production because we have big territorial waters” (Manila Bulletin, 20 August 2007). When the Philippines opened its seafood industry to intensified foreign investment in 2002, policy changes hit Mindanao hard. More than 40 percent of Japanese and Chinese trade agreement goals target this island (Escobar 2004: 39). To cement the role of the Philippines in the ASEAN Free Trade Zone, the Asian Development Bank provided funds to improve the country’s export infrastructure, a sizeable segment aimed at Mindanao. Regional fishing ports were constructed to facilitate export, and six refrigeration facilities were developed (ADB 1999: 12).²⁶ To maximize export durability, twenty processing plants were opened, including eight canneries that can process 300 metric tons daily (Mindanao Magazine, 20 April 2009). The government also promoted fishpond transitions to new species, most of them genetically-modified. For example, the government funded twelve tilapia hatcheries in which it cultivated 60 million fingerlings of genetically-modified tilapia for distribution to commercial fishponds (Asia Pulse, 8 December 2004). Tilapia production was targeted to expand after “conversion of large tracts of land in northern Mindanao into fishponds in line with the project to promote export of tilapia filets to the US” (Aguiba 2004). After Vietnam earned $1 billion from catfish fillet exports to Europe and the US, Vitarich Corporation introduced this species to Mindanao by marketing fingerlings and specialized feeds (Mindanao Magazine, 26 May 2008).

Since 2000, the government has targeted new production strategies in the ocean that it claims will overcome ecological problems of fishponds. The Philippines recruited foreign investments to establish most of its forty mariculture parks in Mindanao (Philippine Star, 23 July 2006). A typical park is 500 hectares or more, with farm plots for fish cages and seaweed farming. Adjacent to these parks are ancillary facilities, such as ice plants, cold storage, canneries, feed mills, and sea cage fabrication (Agribusiness Week, 29 April 2009). Much like a publicly-subsidized industrial park in the US, the mariculture park represents an attempt to rationalize aquaculture production into a vertically-integrated commodity chain. The stated goal is “to develop an area with appropriate equipment and infrastructure that will allow fishermen, fish farmers, and investors to operate cost effectively and securely” (Rosario 2006: 9). The government also “promoted partnerships with foreign investors to intensify commercial fish cage farming,” like the Zamboanga City Mariculture Park (Manila Bulletin, 23 February 2008). To move fish to market as quickly as possible, the government developed a “mariculture highway” system that connects Mindanao parks to ports, in order to “enable the country to be an important player in the live food-fish export market.”²⁷ Though government subsidized, these mariculture parks offer few opportunities for small-scale fishers because they encompass large-scale fishponds established by traders, urban financiers, foreign investors and powerful local officials (Palanca-Tan 2018: 309–310).

In addition to continuing pressures from international development agencies, the United States broadened its funding of “high-value aquaculture” in Mindanao, around three agro-industrial goals: (1) “significant expansion of production and marketing of several lucrative, non-traditional commodities;” (2) establishment of “cold and cool chains” to allow substantial expansion of fresh fish exporting; and (3) stimulation of “a major expansion of exports to the large and growing China market.”²⁸ To “accelerate economic growth in Mindanao,” USAID funded several infrastructure projects that process and store aquaculture and mariculture outputs, including boat landings, port upgrades, road construction, a multi-species hatchery, a mariculture park, a seaweed warehouse and seaweed solar dryers. A new grouper and abalone hatchery in southern Mindanao is operated by Mega Fishing Corporation, a deep sea purse seine operator that ships canned fish to 22 countries. The US Department of Agriculture “Buy USA” website makes clear why the US is funding aquaculture projects in Mindanao: the potential import of American technology, building materials and hardware. The US Embassy Mindanao Initiative and the US Commercial Service stimulated joint ventures between US and Philippine companies, and many of these partnerships offered American investors a four to six year tax holiday, a low income tax rate, and guaranteed 50 to 75-year leases. Buy USA declared that “Mindanao is the Philippines gateway to opportunity,” and it recommended that American businesses export to Mindanao agribusiness and food processing machinery, solar power systems, refrigeration and cold storage equipment, plastic aquaculture building materials, chemical test kits, and flat-rolled iron. Buy USA claimed that “Mindanao has a strong affinity for US brands,” so it recommended that US farmers export wheat, milk and soy products to the region. In fact, the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources cooperated with USAID to try to expand the use of soy-based feeds in aquaculture. In short, the US presence in Mindanao was intended to develop new markets for US agricultural and industrial products.²⁹

For the Panguil Bay area, the primary export goal is to “supply upscale foreign markets” with “high-value, high-demand aquaculture products, such as humpback grouper, tiger prawns, blue crab, sea cucumber, abalone” (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 1 January 2009). To accomplish that, two national goals were set for the Panguil Bay region. First, aquaculture was expanded through the introduction of new genetically-modified species (e.g., tilapia) that were in global demand and through construction and operation of hatcheries and input facilities. Second, the country recruited partnerships with foreign investors to intensify commercial fish cage farming.³⁰ Since 2000, the government has funded several support services to move the region toward a broader aquaculture agenda. Two mariculture parks of 695 hectares were constructed in Lanao del Norte and Misamis Occidental. A fish health lab has opened in Ozamiz City (Media Monitoring Report, November 2004), as well as a marine finfish hatchery in Misamis Occidental. Grow-out cages were established in Panguil Bay to produce fry for cultivation of grouper, milkfish, red snapper, crablets, and seabass (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 1 January 2009). To facilitate long distance shipments of seafoods, ice and cold storage facilities were constructed in the region. A processing plant at Ozamiz City prepared regional fish and shellfish for export to Manila and the world (BFAR 2008b).

These aggressive aquaculture development strategies have stimulated deeper exploitation of regional resources. By 2008, regional aquaculture production was 29 times greater than the 1984 level, but aquaculture outputs grew at less than half that level nationally. By 2005, there were 68 percent more Panguil Bay fishpond hectares than there were in 1988 when the bust stage of shrimp farming hit the country so hard. Between 1995 and 2007, regional aquaculture production more than doubled, and this sector grew more than any commodity except processed chickens. While encompassing less than one percent of the country’s coastal waters, this region generates a disproportionate share of the country’s aquaculture production. In 2008, this small region produced nearly 17 percent of national shrimp output, more than one-third of the country’s mudcrab, but less than 2 percent of national finfish production. While most areas of the country expanded freshwater facilities, nearly 8 percent of the country’s highly-polluting brackish water fishponds were located along Panguil Bay. By 2019, more than 90 percent of the output of national fishponds was milkfish and tilapia (part of which is consumed domestically) while shrimp for export accounted for more than half the output of Panguil Bay fishponds.³¹

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This fishpond specializes in shrimp, and the Panguil Bay region generates nearly 17 percent of the country’s production of this export commodity. However, fishponds like this one do not generate local employment. One laborer handles daily feedings and repairs, and he earns such a low wage that he must engage in part-time capture fishing while his wife must secure additional income from the informal sector

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4.1 Export Functions of the Panguil Bay Region

Since the 1970s, the Panguil Bay region has undergone massive transformation of its relations of food production to become restructured around export activity. Panguil Bay’s resources and fishers have been integrated at three levels. First, Panguil Bay is a production regime in which fishery production has been restructured in response to the country’s international market agendas. Moreover, it is an extractive food enclave that transfers commodities to Manila to be processed for re-export to foreign markets. Second, this region is an ecological extractive enclave that provisions the rest of the country through exports of raw materials to support productive systems in other regions of the country (e.g., fish baits, livestock and aquaculture feeds, hatchery inputs). Third, Mindanao rural areas feed the rest of the country. Panguil Bay communities have been fundamentally changed as the island of Mindanao has been embedded into export chains that move food commodities to the National Capital Region. Consequently, the external trade linkages of Panguil Bay communities have been restructured to move a majority of fishery commodities to Manila where the country’s largest agribusinesses, food processors, and exporters are concentrated.³² Manila acts as an entrepot to process raw materials into value-added commodities for re-export to foreign markets and for re-distribution inside the country. Because Mindanao produces more of the country’s food supply than any other region (Republic of Philippines 1992), the government developed a logistics system to deliver the island’s outputs more rapidly to Manila (Minda News, 17 June 2009). “We have a food security problem,” the Secretary of Agriculture told the Third Aquaculture Congress in Mindanao. “So we need Mindanao to ship more of its products, and we need its food to help feed the 15 million people of Metro Manila” (Minda News, 30 November 2004).

4.2 The Spatial Articulation of the Region’s External Trade

Like the rest of the country, Panguil Bay communities have been articulated with global markets through a multi-level distribution structure in which absentee foreign and national investors and a regional comprador bourgeoisie (Amin 1976) monopolize natural resources and control the flow of food commodities. Networks of regional petty capitalists, brokers, commission merchants and wholesalers are integrated into the commodity chains that transfer regional exports to national wholesalers and processors. Spatially, the villages, towns and cities of the Philippines are hierarchically structured into interlocking zones of production, distribution and consumption. To effect external trade nationally, layers of markets are connected between small villages, regional trading hubs and city bulking centers, commodity importing cities, and trade entrepots. In the Panguil Bay region, the largest cities (e.g., Ozamiz City, Tangub City) are hubs of commercial interaction with other regional communities and with distant territories. Consequently, the region’s larger cities gradually became “foreign bodies” in their local economies, “looking beyond [their] narrow surroundings and out towards the greater movement of the outside world” (Braudel 1981, 2: 117). Export commodities are centralized in these towns where wholesalers, larger traders, merchants and manufacturers are located. Capitalist trading triggers a network of commodity chains in which larger trading hubs subsume nearby smaller communities. In this way, the fragile local economies of the region’s small fishing villages are integrated into the spatial organization of the global food system and into world industrial markets for several nonfoods. Small villages move commodities to towns that have better access to transportation or are more commercialized. From these regional cities, trade goods move to Manila and a few other national trading hubs that provide export linkages for the distant transport of bulky or perishable produce and import linkages for the wholesale distribution of foreign commodities. Local officials and NGO staff estimate that there is a 100 percent profit markup by the time commodities reach Manila. Government policymakers have observed that “raising agricultural and fishery production and competitiveness have not automatically and consistently led to increased farm income” because “an inordinate share of the benefits from higher production goes to middlemen” (Republic of Philippines 2000: 20). In the sections that follow, we will explore the actors and mechanisms through which fishery commodity chains have been constructed to integrate Panguil Bay communities more tightly into national and global markets.

Regional aquaculture production was transformed in the 1990s to move toward specialization in shrimp production for export. Indeed, when compared with production of all finfish through both capture and aquaculture, shrimp exports have been central to Panguil Bay fishery goals since 1993 (BFAR 1993). Between 1988 and 2007, the proportion of regional fishery production represented by shrimp rose steadily. On average since 2000, shrimp accounted for 40 percent of annual seafood output. By 2019, Panguil Bay communities were generating nearly 18 percent of the country’s shrimp and more than one-third of its mudcrabs. Very little of these commodities is marketed locally, except for that small proportion that will not meet export standards. The national goal is to ship abroad as much as possible of these commodities in the fresh/near-fresh state in order to capture the highest prices from countries like Japan (BFAR 2007).³³

4.3 The Crustacean Commodity Chain

Smaller producers of shrimp and crab enter these commodity chains through their ties to local consignment traders who sell on commission to small-scale wholesalers who buy in bulk (see Figure 17). In the Panguil Bay region, shrimp and crab are usually taken to buying stations in Taguitic, Tangub and Ozamiz Cities, and these wholesalers rely on local agents who maintain direct contact with fishers and fishpond operators. Four Kapatagan wholesalers buy and transport about a ton of shrimp and crabs to Manila every day, as do wholesalers at Bonifacio. Eleven wholesalers situated in Aurora and Tambulig also export about a ton every day. Wholesalers finance shrimp farms, botilleros who specialize in crab capturing or middle-class peasant fishers who employ large stationary nets. In these contexts, the producers either are paid a share of their output (a sharecropping arrangement), or they repay indebtedness by marketing their produce to the wholesalers who finance them. These wholesalers pay in advance for stock to be harvested, typically specifying to the fisher or fishpond operator the quantity and quality of the commodity. These centralized marketing stations maintain ice facilities and processing plants where the commodities are sorted and prepared for export to Manila. If a regional wholesaler is financed by a national broker, the commodities will be shipped directly to this agent in or near Manila. Some producers sell directly to itinerant agents (viajeros) of Manila agribusinesses who travel around the Bay communities to make purchases.³⁴

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Commodity chain for Panguil Bay shrimp, prawns, and crabs

SOURCES AND NOTES: INTERVIEWS, PHILIPPINE ANNUAL FISHERIES PROFILE (2000–2019), BFAR WEBSITE. FINANCE AND CREDIT LINKAGES ARE INDICATED BY TWO-DIRECTIONAL ARROWS

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While large fishponds market directly to national wholesalers or processors with whom they have financial or corporate ties, shrimp marketing is more tedious and precarious for smaller producers. The small pond operator must book the sale of a harvest with a buyer who sets the delivery price based on an average body weight that will meet export standards. If the shrimp output does not meet those standards, the buyer will either reject the crop or lower the sale price. In this way, the lowest quality shrimp output may be marketed locally through small vendors in wet markets. In some instances, the small pond operator sells lower quality outputs to a commission trader who disposes of it at low prices to a processor of sauces or mixes. From Panguil Bay communities, the consignment trader transports the commodities to a regional auction, usually at Taguitic or Migpange, where large loads are purchased by agents for national broker or corporations. At Manila, four types of national agents come into play: brokers, corporate representatives, wholesalers or processors. At this level, all the crabs and the highest quality shrimp are sorted and reserved for foreign export. That part of the fresh/frozen shrimp output that is headed abroad will leave the country within a day’s time, but crabs may be air lifted within hours of the catch. Also in Manila, processors prepare shrimp for re-export and for redistribution within the country.

4.4 The Finfish Commodity Chain

As Figure 18 shows, regional marketing of finfish is far less vertically integrated because it involves more transaction points than is the case with shrimp and crabs. In contrast to the shrimp commodity chain, the finfish chain has greater numbers of small traders and larger mid-sector traders, and the path to Manila can be so circuitous that fish can be traded four or more times before reaching a national wholesaler, processor or exporter. Independent peasant fishers enter the commodity chain through small fish traders or cooperatives that market their catches in local public markets, to local retailers or to wholesalers that buy in bulk. However, a majority of peasants either fish on shares or market their catches to a small fish trader or a regional wholesaler who finances their operations.³⁵ Small fishers are trapped in an untenable position. “If they sell their produce, increasingly they lose part of the value by repaying debts to the commercial operators or town dealers who finance their trips and buy part of the catch. Some brokers finance hundreds of canoe fishermen at a time” (Krinks 2002: 134–135).

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Commodity chain for finfish produced in Panguil Bay communities

SOURCES AND NOTES: INTERVIEWS, PHILIPPINE ANNUAL FISHERIES PROFILE (2000–2019), BFAR WEBSITE. POTENTIAL FINANCE AND CREDIT LINKAGES ARE INDICATED BY TWO-DIRECTIONAL ARROWS

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For instance, tuna exporters have thousands of fishers under contract. Typically, small tuna boat operators produce on shares with the wholesalers or processors who finance them. A wholesaler/broker extends credit advances or equipment financing to a boat owner against future catches. “By financing the cost of the fishing operations, the trader is assured of a steady supply of tuna. … Traders generally dictate the going prices of tuna to the disadvantage of the producers, who feel the pricing scheme is cartelized since traders often [set] the same pricing cap” (Vera and Hipolito 2006: 44, 56). Wholesalers do not always accept the highest bid for traded tuna, as they prefer to market to a “preferred client” who can pay cash. Consequently, the producer may not be paid the most competitive price. Some boat-based wholesalers buy directly from small or mid-size boat crews, paying lower prices than the fishers could receive if they directly marketed their catches to land-based wholesalers. In sharp contrast, the 43 commercial tuna boats market directly to a wholesaler.

Wholesalers employ contract farming to control more production of tilapia and milkfish. In these cases, the wholesaler advances capital, equipment and aquaculture feeds, so the producer can generate fish at standards and prices set before production. Construction of capital intensive stationary fishing nets (e.g., sangaab, bungsod) are “usually financed, and their operations controlled, by…fish traders, fish processors, and exporters. This arrangement ensures a ready market for the harvested fish; the buying price, however, is dictated by the capitalists, to the disadvantage of the fishermen” (MSU Naawan Foundation 2006: 185). Large corporate fishponds often finance smaller fishponds and market their outputs. Regionally, six exporters operate trading stations, and their local agents operate on commission for distant exporters who advance funds to be used to finance local fishers. Because a majority of small fishponds have been financed by traders, two-thirds of milkfish is marketed through wholesalers who buy in bulk. Payment is delayed to producers, as the fish is sold through silent auctions. Wholesalers load (or require producers to do so) finfish into 33 kilogram containers for auction. However, the trader (and the subsequent buyer) pays for 30 kilograms, externalizing to each producer an arbitrary charge for spoilage or product damage during transport to a distant market. In this way, risk from the trader’s handling is shifted to the producers.

In addition to their structured linkages to Manila, these regional commodity chains exhibit four striking features. First, these are noncompetitive trading chains in which a few wholesalers/brokers dictate terms and conditions to many producers and to lower level traders. A majority of fishers and small fishpond operators are financed by, and must market their outputs through, wholesalers who have the capacity to manage long-distance transport, the technology to prevent spoilage, and the linkages required to market the commodities at the national and/or international levels. Indeed, there are numerous points in the commodity chains at which the lower level producer or trader is financed by the next higher level. Second, the commodity chains are polarized between those agents who market the most profitable seafoods that will leave the country in fresh/frozen form and those that handle finfish.³⁶ Because shrimp and crabs have the highest market values nationally and globally, the trade chains for these commodities are much more vertically integrated than the trade in finfish. The handling of the most expensive commodities is more rationalized among fewer layers of agents to insure expeditious transport to Manila or foreign markets. Third, the largest producers hold a market competitive position while small producers face three disadvantages. Financed fishers and fishpond operators must market their outputs noncompetitively to the investors to whom they are indebted, so they cannot competitively seek out higher prices. Thus peasant fishers or small fishpond operators are not able to reject or to bargain up the prices at which their commodities are sold. Since smaller operators are already controlled through credit terms, wholesalers do not view them as “preferred clients” to whom they need to extend special favors to sustain supply flow. Moreover, there are several points at which producers can be cheated or have their output quantities diminished in favor of the trader or wholesaler. For instance, producers are never paid for the full quantity of their outputs because wholesalers shift to producers the risk of spoilage losses by discounting the weight 9 percent or more (Interviews). Finally, only lower quality seafoods are targeted for local markets. Small fish vendors sell locally those fish catches that have such low commercial value that wholesalers will not purchase them. Smaller regional wholesalers and consignment traders sell to local retailers bulk supplies that have little commercial value, including substandard tilapia and milkfish. Purcell (2017) estimates that Asian small-scale fishers average 50 percent of the retail value for the lowest-value species (most finfish) and 10 percent for the highest-value species (shrimp, lobsters, crab, live reef fish).

4.5 The Live Reef Fish Commodity Chain

Live reef fish and exotic species are the most valued commodities in the Asian fishery trade (SEAFEDC 2017: 142). Throughout the Coral Triangle of the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, more than 35,000 small-scale fishers exploit coral reefs, 27,000 of them situated in the Philippines. In 2009, the Philippines provided more than half the exports for the live reef fish trade which is valued at $2 billion annually. Since the 1990s, the primary driver for this trade has been the demand from Hong Kong and mainland China restaurants for exotic live finfish (especially grouper), mollusks (e.g., oysters, clams), shellfish (e.g., lobster, crabs) and cepahlopods (e.g., squid, octopi, sea cucumber). Even though product scarcity triggers higher prices, demand continues to rise because consumers prefer live species over pond and cage-produced commodities. A majority of the reef species are exported by air to Hong Kong, then re-exported to Shenzhen where the largest Chinese wholesalers are located. From there, the live reef commodities are distributed throughout mainland China by specialized trucks. Fewer than twenty major traders, middlemen and exporters collectively handle the reef fish trade in Hong Kong and China. Secondarily, fishers capture species for the ornamental species trade that is valued at nearly $1 billion yearly; these live species are marketed for American and European aquariums. Since 2010, a tertiary market has developed to sell juvenile fish and “trash fish” to operators who hold and grow smaller species in marine cages until they reach a larger, more profitable size (Elliott and Jang 2011; Maclean and Sadovy 2003; Padilla et al. 2003).

Most of the reef fishers are small-scale independent operators who have few viable livelihood options. Reef species often provide four to six times the average price for non-reef species (Burke et al 2002: 30), so fishers are willing to take on debt for the $700 initial investment in boats and gear (Maclean and Sadovy 2003: 36). As a result, at least one of every 51 Philippine peasant fishers is enmeshed in the trade through a system of debt bondage that embeds them in a oligopolistic commodity chain that consists of a handful of regional middleman traders that operate collection stations for Manila-based exporters (Padilla et al. 2003). In this regard, Panguil Bay fishers have much in common with other rural Asians, for such arrangements are common throughout the Asian fisheries (see Table 14). Middlemen provide boats, gear and loans to fishers who repay the debt in installments by marketing their catches exclusively to these oligopolistic traders (Elliott and Jang 2011).³⁷ “The fishermen take their catch to the middleman and sell it at the prevailing price. When catch is low, or during lean periods, the middlemen provide for [fishing gear repairs and household necessities]. … Payments are made in the subsequent fishing expeditions until the debt [including interest] is fully paid. As conditions become dire, the more indebted the fishermen become. The situation often leaves them in debt all year round and subsequently fully dependent on income from the live reef fishing trade to pay off debts” (Padilla et al. 2003: 6). The catch fisher receives about 30 percent of the price received by the middleman for the exported commodity (Maclean and Sadovy 2003: 34). Even though wholesale prices at Hong Kong range from $11 to $63 per kilogram, the typical Philippine reef fisher averages less than $50 monthly, before debt payments (Burke at al. 2002).

With 25,060 square kilometers of coral reefs, the Philippines is ranked among the world’s coastal areas that have the highest levels of marine biodiversity (Spalding et al. 2001). The overfishing and destructive fishing methods associated with the live reef trade have seriously degraded Philippine coral reefs. By 2017, 90 percent of Philippine coral reefs were in fair to poor condition, compared to 93 percent of reefs around the coasts and bays of Mindanao (Licuanan 2017). In addition to severe overfishing of reef species, two illegal destructive fishing methods are utilized to maximize production quickly. Poisons are the predominant method used to capture high-value reef fish. Divers apply sodium cyanide to reefs to stun fish. The process destroys many fish and can leave residues that are harmful to humans. The initial poisoning bleaches part or all of the coral, and repeated incidents can kill vast areas of coral. Some fishers employ dynamite or cheap handmade grenades. A typical beer-bottle bomb can leave a crater of rubble one to two meters in diameter, and regularly bombed reefs frequently exhibit 50 to 80 percent coral mortality (Burke et al. 2002: 28).

5.1 The Philippine Suki Tradition

Scholars who studied the country’s fishing communities in the 1970s and 1980s call attention to the suki linkages between fishers and fish traders, and a majority of Philippine analyses emphasize the exploitative aspects of this trade relationship. In the suki relationship, the fisher markets catches to the same buyer, who extends “favors,” such as credit. In the past, scholars have reported that Philippine fishers are “tied to particular buyers, known locally as suki, from whom they obtain credit and sometimes inputs, such as fuel, and to whom they must sell their catch, often at a 10% discount on price received” (Smith and Mines 1982: 22–23). According to Jocano and Veloro (1976: 110–27), the indebtedness of the peasant fisher is advantageous to the suki because it helps to insure a steady supply of fish. However, the suki acts in a noncompetitive fashion to set the price of the commodity below its market value and demands immediate repayment of loans if the fisher takes a catch to another trader. Many suki charge outrageous interest rates over time, but the system persists because peasants have no better means to obtain credit. While low-level suki relationships may have characterized local fish trading through the early 1990s, these small operators play a less crucial role in contemporary marketing. While small fish traders and municipal market-based suki still exist in great numbers, a majority of the Panguil Bay producers acquire financing for their fishing equipment from agents who operate at higher levels in the marketing system.⁴⁰

There are several points in the commodity chains at which producers can become financially-bound to the buyers of their seafoods. Since 1995, credit and marketing have been interlocked at three levels. First, most poor peasants acquire credit from small fish traders who advance small amounts for household needs against future production. Second, at least 60 percent of the peasants fish on shares for traders or wholesalers who advance capital for boats, equipment, stationary net systems and household survival needs. Third, middle class producers acquire credit or financing from large exporters who are seeking to control fishery outputs into the future (Interviews). What has changed in the modern context is that small fish dealers and suki in municipal markets cannot finance the kinds of costly technologies that the most productive fishers and fishpond operators utilize. Being able to advance credit allows regional level wholesalers to capture a higher segment of the total production, and this is the degree of market monopoly that all traders seek to gain. On the one hand, national firms decentralize agents into regions like Panguil Bay, and these agents are able to extend higher credit levels than local suki. On the other hand, regional wholesalers often secure capital from national-level wholesalers or agribusinesses that advance funds to be used to insure monopsonistic advantages with producers.

5.2 Parallels in Other Countries

In sharp contrast to previous scholars who have analyzed Philippine fish trading as culturally distinct or “economically backward” (Szanton 1972), we would like to emphasize that this country’s marketing strategies and mechanisms are quite similar to food and fish marketing worldwide. The monopsony, small producer exploitation and debt bondage that characterize Philippine fishery commodity chains have been observed in fishing communities all over the Global South and several richer countries. These types of exploitative trading linkages continue to exist in the global food system because they are so profitable for the largest traders in the commodity chain. Rather than being “economically backward” structures that modern capitalists seek to obliterate, seafood marketing systems like those in the Philippines institutionalize mechanisms through which most of the risks are externalized to producers while minimizing their proportion of the total value of the chain. This country is not unique in its lack of competitive finance mechanisms for fishers, for credit has been employed in fisheries worldwide as a key method to control laborers and to acquire their outputs at below-market prices. “Smaller firms and individual producers are integrated into the operations of the big corporations as suppliers of raw materials and primary products. … Only those firms with high investment exposure and easy access to unlimited credit through close connection with the centers of political power manage to appropriate the greater bulk of the economic benefits” (Tadem et al. 1984: 6).

As in other countries, the greatest power and profit in Philippine fishery commodity chains accrue to those marketing agents who have inequitable control over or access to limited services that are crucial to the production and distribution processes, particularly (1) political or economic assets that favor some actors in the chain over others; (2) credit and finance; (3) transport mechanisms in areas where there are limited options for producers: (4) food preservation mechanisms and capacity to process foods to meet distant standards; (5) the most timely knowledge about changes in demand or prices in distant markets: and (6) ties to distant wholesalers and retailers. These features are not peculiar to the Philippines, as there are parallel rural fish marketing strategies in many countries.⁴¹ Indeed, this type of exploitative profit-taking by non-producers is “normal capitalism” at its best in the global food system. In addition to ecological surplus drains, transnational corporations transfer wealth to foreign countries through imported technology, technical and advising fees, interest on financing, and foreign manager salaries (Pelupessy and Vankempen 2005).

7.1 Declining Local Consumption

The regional re-orientation of productive assets to prioritize exports has led to serious shortfalls in rice and seafoods, the traditional pillars of the Philippine diet. In 2007, local consumption needs exceeded the available rice supply by nearly 24,000 metric tons, representing a shortfall to nearly one-quarter of the population (see Table 13) Threats to local consumption of seafoods are even worse. Once we take into account exports and conversions to feeds, less than one-third of 2007 fishery and aquaculture production was left for local human consumption. In 2007, there was a deficit of 246,412 metric tons. Indeed, local consumption requirements were six times greater than the available supply of fish, shellfish and crustaceans. In this context, fishery commodities are too scarce and too expensive for a majority of Panguil Bay households, especially those that are highest in iron. “Only fish traders can afford to buy pansat [shrimp], alimango [crab] and pugapo [grouper]. Once very abundant in the wild and consumable items on the fishers’ tables, these seafoods are collected, cultured or fattened and exported to outside markets (MSU Naawan Foundation 2006: 234, 265).

Why has local consumption declined? First, fewer of the available ecological resources are utilized to generate foods for local consumption, and three-quarters of farm hectares are growing nonfood or export crops (see Table 13). Thus there is only one hectare of rice to every 5.6 hectares of crops that are not eaten locally.⁴⁵ Prioritization of export aquaculture has further exacerbated the situation. While other Asian countries were less likely to convert croplands to fishponds between 1975 and 2000 (FAO 2004b), that threat to food security was quite obvious along Panguil Bay. By 2005, more than 82 percent of fishponds were situated on private lands that had once grown crops.⁴⁶ What is even more alarming is the ratio of fishponds to croplands. In 2010, the region had one fishpond hectare to every 4.6 hectares of croplands for domestic consumption.⁴⁷ Moreover, there was one fishpond hectare to every 2.8 hectares of rice. In aquaculture, export-oriented production of shrimp and a few species of finfish have been prioritized over seafoods for local consumption, so regional production of milkfish declined steadily between 1984 and 2000. Production of milkfish began to rise again after 2002 when the national government began to target this variety for export.⁴⁸ Fetishized as a “high value” seafood that will attract future foreign exchange, traditionally consumed milkfish has risen in value so much that local prices were 1.5 times higher in 2009 than they were in 2000 (BFAR 2000–2009).⁴⁹

7.2 Conversion of Nutrients to Nonfoods

Many seafoods that were once consumed as part of the human diet have been redirected into nonfood uses. According to the fisher coalition Kilusang Mangingisda, export-oriented aquaculture has led to massive loss of wild foods in mangrove areas and to dwindling fishery stocks (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 18 April 2008). Because aquaculture facilities require three kilograms of fish protein to every kilogram produced (BFAR 2006), Panguil Bay mollusks and shellfish have been depleted to a crisis point. Fishpond operators gradually worked their way downward through four increasingly smaller shellfish species, competing with the human food chain to redirect natural resources to feed shrimp. Amahong and burnay, two species of mussels that have been a traditional part of local diets, are nearly extinct due to uncontrolled, unregulated and continuous harvesting to collect feeds for shrimp production.⁵⁰ Once these two species were in limited supply, punaw was the next marine resource depleted to feed the shrimp farms. Punaw are so limited that this traditional food shellfish is expensive in local markets. After punaw were diminished, fishpond farmers substituted agihis which are also threatened. Once plentiful in the shallow coastal waters, these small fish are now concentrated in deeper waters and are difficult to harvest. In addition, nearly 13 percent of the local seafood supply is processed into fishmeal and fish oil to be used as additives in aquaculture and livestock feeds. Nationally, 55 feed mills integrate fish and shellfish into feeds (Bestari and Morales 2005: 15–16), so there is increasing demand for smaller, cheaper fishes from Panguil Bay for this purpose. Poor peasant fishers are alarmed about what next will disappear from their ecosystem, as they have observed declines in crabs, shrimp, larger fish species, clams, and small food fish and shellfish over the last three decades (Interviews). According to Primavera (2000: 102), “Philippine fisheries are so degraded, fish supplies are so inadequate, and people are so poor that they need fish of all sizes and prices.” In 2008, however, exports and nonfoods accounted for nearly 88 percent of Panguil Bay aquaculture production. Milkfish, the species most consumed by Filipinos, is increasingly targeted for nonfood use. While there is an inadequate supply of milkfish to meet local needs, the national government is encouraging use of milkfish as bait to catch tuna.⁵¹

The transformation of seaweed from part of the traditional Filipino diet to a “high-value” export commodity is instructive. In 1998, the Philippines ranked third among seaweed producing nations, rising to second in 1999. By 2001, seaweed cultivation accounted for two-thirds of the country’s total aquaculture output in tons (Albor 2002). The Philippines specializes in three types of seaweed exporting. The country is the largest carrageenan chips manufacturer globally and the world’s third largest producer of refined carrageenan, annually shipping to Spain, Denmark, France, India, and the United States 115,000 metric tons of semiprocessed seaweed worth $69 million, most of those exports deriving from Mindanao. In addition, 22,500 metric tons are exported annually as seaweed extracts valued at $105 million (BFAR 2009). Peasants indicate that several varieties of seaweed were gathered from the wild for the local diet in the 1970s and 1980s when there was no commercial production along Panguil Bay. Between 1988 and 2000, the region averaged less than 60 metric tons annually, and most of this was consumed locally. Due to national demand for more seaweed output to support national manufacturing of carrageenan for export, Panguil Bay production rose sharply after 2000.⁵² By 2008, regional seaweed farms were producing nearly 36,000 metric tons, an output level that was 968 times greater than the 2000 production. In 1988, tuna and shrimp accounted for 80 percent of the market value of regional seafood exports while the market value of seaweed was minuscule. By 2005, the value of regional seaweed exports exceeded tuna, shrimp and crabs– even though this nonfood sells at a far lower prices than the seafoods. Less than one-third of Philippine seaweed output is used as food, but most of that is exported in dried form to Japanese and Chinese markets.⁵³ Moreover, gathering from the wild has been rendered dangerous by the periodic upsurges of “red tide” toxins that have been stimulated by aquaculture expansion all over Asia.⁵⁴