We promised to keep secret the identities of peasant fishers, NGO staff and local public officials who encompass the vast majority of those to whom we need to show respect for the knowledge, hospitality, guidance and extra bits of help that made our research manageable in difficult, under-funded circumstances. Many of you opened your homes, took hours away from your work schedules, and shared scare food resources with us. One of you fisherwomen told us that “the world does not weep” for endangered peasant fishers and their communities. Taking to heart what you told us, we have done our best in this book and in our public presentations to make people stop to see the globalized world from your vantage point. In the words of the Philippine Catholic Bishops (“Pastoral Letter on Ecology,” 1988):
However, we also need to thank a group of people whose identities we can publicly acknowledge. We wish to express our deep appreciation and warm affection to the many Philippine feminists, fishery/mangrove scholars, nutritional analysts, and time-analysis specialists whose published scholarship we gleaned to construct the historiography of how the Philippines was transformed into a food extractive enclave to feed the world. Our bibliography reflects that many of you were on the early cutting edge of concern about hunger, women’s overwork, and destruction of the country’s ecological resources. Your empirical and conceptual clues often guided us toward deeper, more complex questions and methodologies. We are aware that some of you took political risks by being critical, so we thank you for your brave fortitude.