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Food Sovereignty and Sustainability: A Case Study of the Philippines

Thesis · May 2015

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 University of San Francisco

Food Sovereignty and Sustainability: A Case Study of the

Philippines

A Thesis Presented to
The Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences
Master’s Program in International Studies

In Partial Fulfillment
Of the Requirements for the Degree
Master of Arts in International Studies

by
Darlene Mendoza Wiedemann
May 2015
 Food Sovereignty and Sustainability: A Case Study of the
Philippines

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree

MASTER OF ARTS

in

INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

by

DARLENE MENDOZA WIEDEMANN

May 29th, 2015

UNIVERSITY OF SAN FRANCISCO

Under the guidance and approval of the committee, and approval by all of the members,
this thesis has been accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree.

APPROVED:

______________________________________________ _________________
Advisor Date

______________________________________________ _________________
Academic Director Date

______________________________________________ _________________
Dean of Arts and Sciences Date
 Abstract

La Via Campesina, a small farmer advocacy group, introduced the concept of

food sovereignty in reaction to the food inequities and environmental degradation

brought on by the predominant neoliberal western-style of the global food system. This

paper critiques the concept of food sovereignty as a universal solution to this problem.

Given that each country has unique political, environmental, and cultural challenges, the

underlying logic of this study is to understand “why.” By using the Philippines as a case

study this research provides a systematic approach to evaluating the merits of food

sovereignty. I argue that maintaining national food sovereignty is not agriculturally

sustainable given the country’s unique challenges, such as being geographically small,

archipelagic, and disaster-prone. In addition, the Philippine government’s decision to

implement a national Food Staples Sufficiency Program (FSSP) in 2011, as a food

sovereignty resolution, is vulnerable to population growth, increasing urbanization,

geographic constraints and natural disasters. With that said, FSSP will have adverse

impacts on the country’s ability to keep up with growing agricultural demands.

Currently, the country is 97 percent rice self-sufficient due to the implementation

of the Food Staples Sufficiency Program. Eventually, due to the country’s unique

challenges and vulnerabilities it will have to depend on food imports and the international

trade market, but what could Philippines do to mitigate adverse impacts of food

dependency?
 Acknowledgements

Special thanks to Professor Bartlett and Lindsay Arentz for everything they put
into creating a memorable MAIS program. Every class was suitable to my goals and I
never felt drowned in administrative tasks because of their support. I would also like to
thank Professor Loperena whose guidance throughout this Master’s program helped me
grow and most importantly gave me the tools to help shed light on the injustices of this
world. Finally, I would also like to thank and acknowledge my thesis advisor, Professor
Ziegler, for constructive critiques, attention to detail, recommendations, and insights on
food security and food sovereignty. This thesis would not have been possible without
your brilliance, undivided attention, and support.

Next, I would like to thank the scientists, engineers, and people of NASA, the
SETI Institute, ASP, and DLR, especially those people in the SOFIA program and the
Planetary Sustainability office. You showed me what it meant to be passionate and
fearless (where fearless is an euphemism for a little insane), ingredients needed to plunge
into the vastness of space in order to reach for the stars.

Finally, I would like to send a heartfelt thanks to my friends and family for all of
their love and support. First, I would like to thank: Maritess, Gigi, Christel, Jonilynn,
Cristina, Nora, Sarah, Sila, Malai, and Mama Leona for showing me how to reach for the
stars, while keeping my feet on the ground. To my parents, Helen and Donato, thank you
for blessing me with a life filled with unconditional love, support and teaching us to
always help others and recycle. To my siblings, Leonie and Daniel, you are everything to
me. You are truly the greatest presents Mom and Dad have ever given me.

To my husband! I cannot thank you enough for the numerous ways you have been
supportive, especially in those moments when I just wanted to give up. You were there to
wipe away the stress and tears, and to buy the much-needed coffee. I look forward to
writing the next chapter in our lives, when we are both finished with our degrees!

To my grandfather who called all of his grandchildren #1, for which I thrived to
be his number 1, you taught me the most valuable life lesson – everyone is #1 and
deserved to be loved.
 We choose to go to the moon in this decade . . . not because they are easy, but because

they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our

energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are

unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.

John F. Kennedy

(A man who led a nation to the moon.)

If we can conquer space, we can conquer childhood hunger.

Buzz Aldrin

(A man who walked on the moon.)

 Table of Contents

Abstract
Acknowledgements
Inspiration
List of Figures ................................................................................................................... i
List of Acronyms and Abbreviations ............................................................................ ii
Terms and Concepts ....................................................................................................... iv

Chapter I: Introduction
1.1 Statement of the Problem ................................................................................. 3
1.2 Purpose of the Study ......................................................................................... 7
1.3 Hypothesis and Research Question .................................................................. 7
1.4 Limitations of the Study.................................................................................... 8
1.5 Theoretical Framework ..................................................................................... 8

Chapter II: Methodology

2.1 Interest in this topic......................................................................................... 10
2.2 Research Strategy and Data Collection .......................................................... 12

Chapter III: Review of the Literature

3.1 Literature on Food Sovereignty ..................................................................... 14
3.1.1 State of the Global Food System .................................................... 14
3.1.2 Contemporary Debate on Farming Scale ........................................ 19
3.1.3 Food Sovereignty ............................................................................ 24
3.2 Literature on Sustainability ............................................................................ 37
3.2.1 Evolution of Sustainability ............................................................. 37
3.2.2 Climate Change ............................................................................... 43
Chapter IV: The Republic of the Philippines
4.1 The History and Background of the Philippines ............................................ 51
4.2 Agriculture ..................................................................................................... 59

Chapter V: Data/Findings
5.1 Statement of the Thesis .................................................................................. 66
5.2 Identifying the Challenges in Maintaining Food Sovereignty
5.2.1 Criterion 1: Right to Food ............................................................... 68
5.2.2 Criterion 2: Enabling Sustainability ................................................ 73
5.2.3 Criterion 3: National Capacity to Define Food System .................. 79
5.2.4 Criterion 4: Local Capacity to Define Food System ....................... 82
5.2.5 Criterion 5: Social Equality ............................................................ 84

Chapter VI: Summary and Conclusions

6.1 Summarizing the Challenges ......................................................................... 86
6.1.1 Socio-Economic Challenge ............................................................. 86
6.1.2 Environmental Challenge ................................................................ 88
6.1.3 Cultural and Educational Challenge ............................................... 90
6.2 Conclusion ..................................................................................................... 91
6.3 Broader Implications ...................................................................................... 96
6.4 Recommendations .......................................................................................... 97

References ....................................................................................................................... 99
 Wiedemann i

List of Figures

Figure 1: Summary of Theoretical Framework ................................................................. 9

Figure 2: Diagram of a Food System .............................................................................. 14

Figure 3: Small-Scale versus Large-Scale Farming Debate Spectrum ........................... 19

Figure 4: Sustainable Development Goals ...................................................................... 41

Figure 5: Temperature Trends ......................................................................................... 45

Figure 6: Seventeen Regions of the Philippines ............................................................. 59

Figure 7: Evolution of the Agrarian Reform Policies ..................................................... 61

Figure 8: Top Eight Commodities in Philippine Agricultural Output ............................ 62

Figure 9: Typhoon Haiyan Over the Philippines ............................................................ 65

Figure 10: Theoretical Framework ................................................................................. 96

 Wiedemann ii

List of Acronyms and Abbreviations

°C Celsius
°F Fahrenheit
AAS Aquatic Agricultural Systems
BAS Philippine Bureau of Agricultural Statistics
B.C.E. Before the Common Era
CGIAR Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers
CH4 Methane
CO2 Carbon dioxide
COP Conference of the Parties
DOA Philippine Department of Agriculture
FAO Food and Agriculture Organization
FFF Federation of Free Farmers
FSSP Food Staples Sufficiency Program
GATT General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade
GDP Gross domestic product
GHGs Greenhouse gases
GHI Global Hunger Index
GMOs Genetically Modified Organisms
GVA Gross value added
ha Hectares
HYVs High-yielding Varieties
IATP Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
IFAD International Fund for Agricultural Development
IFPRI International Food Policy Research Institute
IMF International Monetary Fund
IPPC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
IRRI International Rice Research Institute
ISO Institute of Social Order
kg Kilograms
km Kilometers
KMP Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas
M99 Masagana 99
MASIPAG Magsasaka at Siyentipiko para sa Pag-unlad ng Agrikultura
MDG Millennium Development Goals
 Wiedemann iii

mm Millimeter
MODE Management and Organizational Development for Empowerment
MT Metric tons
N2 O Nitrous oxide
NAFTA North American Free Trade Agreement
NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration
NCGA National Corn Growers Association
NFA National Food Authority
NGO Non-governmental organization
NPP net primary production
NRDC Natural Resources Defense Council
NSCB National Statistical Coordination Board
PAGASA Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services
Administration
PAR Philippine area of responsibility
PARAGOS Pagkakaisa para sa Tunay na Repormang Agraryo at Kaunlarang
Pangkanayunan
PhP Philippine peso
POW Prisoners of war
PRNRPS Philippine National REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and
Forest Degradation)-Plus Strategy
SDG Sustainable Development Goals
U.S. United States
UN United Nations
UNFCCC United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
USAID U.S. Agency for International Development
USD United States Dollar
WFP World Food Programme
WHO World Health Organization
WTO World Trade Organization
WWI World War One
WWII World War Two
 Wiedemann iv

Terms and Concepts

Agrarian Transition: men tend to exit first from agriculture, resulting in a growing
feminization of agriculture – as measured by the ratio of women and men working in the
sector. A second indicator of the gendered nature of the agrarian transition is reflected in
the high proportion of women whose main employment is in agriculture. (FAO, 2013)

Agroecology: is an applied science, adapting ecological concepts and principles to the

design and management of sustainable agroecosystems and providing a framework for
assessing the performance of agroecosystems. (Altieri, 2005)

Big Food Actors: refers to the top ten multinational food and beverage corporations that
control more than half of all food sales (Stuckler, Nestle, 2012).

Climate Change: refers to a change in the state of the climate that can be identified by
changes in the mean and/or the variability of its properties, and that persists for an
extended period, typically decades or longer. (IPCC, 2014)

Food Miles: the distance food travels from where it is grown to where it is ultimately
purchased or consumed. (NRDC, 2007)

Food Security: exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic
access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food and food preferences to meet their dietary
needs for an active and healthy life. (FAO, 2003)
• Availability is when sufficient quantities of food of appropriate quality,
supplied through domestic production or imports (including food aid).
• Access is by individuals to adequate resources for acquiring appropriate foods
for a nutritious diet.
• Utilization is of food through adequate diet, clean water, sanitation and health
care to reach a state of nutritional wellbeing where all physiological needs are
met. This brings out the importance of non-food inputs in food security.
• Stability is to be food secure, a population, household or individual must have
access to adequate food at all times, and should not risk losing access to food
as a consequence of sudden shocks (e.g. an economic or climatic crisis) or
cyclical events (e.g. seasonal food insecurity).1

1
FAO. (2006). Policy brief: Food security. <http://www.fao.org/forestry/13128-
0e6f36f27e0091055bec28ebe830f46b3.pdf>
 Wiedemann v

Food Sovereignty: the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food
produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define
their own food and agriculture systems. (La Via Campesina 1990, Nyéléni Forum in
2007)

Global Hunger Index: to reflect the multidimensional nature of hunger, the GHI
combines three equally weighted indicators into one index:
• Undernourishment: the proportion of undernourished people as a percentage
of the population (reflecting the share of the population with insufficient
caloric intake).
• Child underweight: the proportion of children younger than age five who are
underweight (low weight for age reflecting wasting, stunted growth, or both),
which is one indicator of child undernutrition.
• Child mortality: the mortality rate of children younger than age five
(partially reflecting the fatal synergy of inadequate dietary intake and
unhealthy environments). (IFPRI, 2013)

Green Revolution: the first investments in research on rice and wheat, two of the most
important food crops for developing countries. The breeding of improved varieties,
combined with the expanded use of fertilizers, other chemical inputs and irrigation, led to
dramatic yield increases in Asia and Latin America, beginning in the late 1960s. In 1968,
U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Administrator William S. Gaud
coined the term “Green Revolution” to describe this phenomenal growth in agriculture.
(IFPRI, 2002)

Malnutrition: an abnormal physiological condition caused by inadequate, unbalanced or

excessive consumption of macronutrients and/or micronutrients. Malnutrition includes
undernutrition and overnutrition as well as micronutrient deficiencies. (FAO, 2014)

Millennium Development Goal Target One: the United Nations gathered in 2000 for
the Millennium Summit to adopt eight international developments goals. The goal of
target one is to eradicate hunger and poverty, by halving the proportion of people who
suffer from hunger and whose income is less than $1.25 a day between 1990 and 2015.
(UN, 2000)

Multilateralism: an adjective that modifies the noun institution; it coordinates behavior

among three or more states on the basis of generalized principles of conduct. These
principles are: nondiscrimination, indivisibility (a social construction – states behave as
though peace, for example, is indivisible and thereby make it so), and diffuse reciprocity
(the arrangements yields a rough equivalence of benefits in the aggregate and over time).
 Wiedemann vi

These principles specify appropriate conduct for a class of actions, without regard to the
particular interests of the parties of the strategic exigencies that may occur in a specific
occurrence. (Ruggie, 1993)

Neoliberalism: is a perspective that champions the market as the prime regulator of

economic activity and seeks to limit the intervention of the state in economic life to a
minimum. Neoliberalism in recent times has become identified with economics, given its
hegemony as a paradigm within the discipline, that is, its excluding of other perspectives
as legitimate ways of doing economics. (Bello, 2009)

Nutrition Transition: the increasing consumption of fats, sweeteners, energy-dense

foods, and highly processed foods compared to traditional diets characterized by higher
intake of cereals. (WHO, 2007)

Philippine Poverty Threshold: a family of five will need around PhP5,513 monthly
($133.65 USD) income to buy their minimum basic food needs; and around PhP7,890
monthly ($191.28 USD) for their minimum basic food and non-food needs in 2012.
(NSCB, 2012)

Sustainability: is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising
the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It contains within it two key
concepts:
• The concept of ‘needs’, in particular the essential needs of the world’s poor, to
which overriding priority should be given; and
• The idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social
organization on the environment’s ability to meet present and future needs.
(Brundtland, 1987)

Undernourishment: a state, lasting for at least one year, of inability to acquire enough
food, defined as a level of food intake insufficient to meet dietary energy requirements.
(FAO, 2014)

Vulnerability: is the exposure to risk and the lack of ability to cope with its
consequences. The vulnerability of households and communities depends largely on their
ability to cope with exposure to risks associated with shocks such as flood, drought, crop
blight or infestation, economic fluctuation and conflict. (WFP, Philippines, 2012)
 Wiedemann 1

Chapter I: Introduction

This paper critiques the concept of “food sovereignty,” the right of nations to

define its own food system, and questions the benefits of achieving national food self-

sufficiency as a resolution to achieving food sovereignty in the Philippines, by examining

challenges according to three criteria: socio-economic and political; environmental and;

cultural and educational. Throughout this paper I address the question, what are the

implications of national food sovereignty for the Philippines? In summary, these are the

implications:

1) Despite efforts to alleviate food insecurity, the Philippines still have a Global
Hunger Index (GHI) at 13 percent as of 2013 (IFPRI, 2013). GHI equally
measures undernourishment, children who are underweight, and child mortality
into one index. The adverse environmental impacts of achieving national staple
food self-sufficiency as a food sovereignty resolution could intensify the current
conditions of food insecurity.

2) In 1960, the introduction of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) gave
way to the Philippine Green Revolution. This Revolution coupled with population
growth contributed heavily to environmental degradation and deforestation
throughout the 1970s and 1980s, and continues to have adverse impacts to
agricultural sustainability today. In a similar fashion, achieving food
independence could exacerbate environmental degradation and deforestation.

3) The Philippines’ population is currently 98.39 million people. The population is

expected to increase to 130 million by 2050 (UN, Department of Economics and
Social Affairs, 2013). In addition, the percentage of Filipinos living in cities and
urban areas is expected to increase from 50 percent in 2013 to 84 percent in 2050
(UN Habitat, 2013). A declining peasant population means fewer farmers will
have to provide food for an increasing urban population.
 Wiedemann 2

4) The Philippines’ is located along the Ring of Fire2 and along a typhoon belt. It is
prone to volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, typhoons, and floods. According to the
World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the Philippine Area of
Responsibility (PAR) witnessed 20 tropical cyclones in 2008 (WMO, 2009, 4).
Given that a third of the Philippines’ total land area is used for agriculture and 41
percent of the population worked in the agricultural sector in 2012 (Briones,
2005), these weather and geological risks threaten the livelihood of many farmers
and agricultural prosperity.

5) While developing archipelagic countries like the Philippines will be the most
vulnerable to the negative impacts of climate change, they do not have the
resources to invest in adaptation and mitigation technologies.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), population growth,

coupled with environmental degradation and climate change, challenge global food

sustainability. Global population is expected to reach nine billion people by 2050. In

order to keep up with future demands, world food production must increase by 70 percent

from the amount of food produced in 2009, while also addressing scarce agricultural

resources, such as fresh water, nutrient soil, and arable lands (FAO, 2009). In addition,

“urbanization will continue at an accelerated pace, and about 70 percent of the world’s

population will be urban (compared to 49 percent in 2009),” (FAO, 2009, 2). In the

Philippines nearly four-fifths of the population will live in cities by 2050. This means

fewer farmers will have to keep up with growing demands. The threat of global food

unsustainability will exacerbate the current state of food insecurity and food sovereignty

in developing countries.

2
The Ring of Fire is the most seismically active region along the Pacific Ocean leading to the most cases of
earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Areas such as California, Japan and the Philippines sit along the Ring of Fire.
 Wiedemann 3

1.1 Statement of the Problem

The Philippine Rice Crisis of 2008 demonstrated the vulnerability of the

Philippines to the volatility and inequities of the current global food system. The

Philippine Rice Crisis occurred when the price of rice almost tripled in the first quarter of

2008 from the last quarter of 2007. The sudden increase in price of this staple worsened

food accessibility since “rice accounts for 28.8 percent of total budget of the lower

income of the population and 36.8 percent of their food budget” (Regalado, 2010, 28).

Since 1972, it has been the responsibility of the Philippine government’s National Food

Authority (NFA) “to stabilize the price of rice consistent with farm prices that are

remunerative to the country’s rice farmers and retail prices reasonable enough for the

country’s consumers,” (Intal, Cu, Illescas, 2012, 1). In 2008, the NFA stepped in by

distributing two kilos (little more than 4lbs) of subsidized rice at half the cost to each

person who woke up early enough to stand in long lines before the government

organization’s trucks ran out of supply (Regalado, 2010). Modern agriculture has made it

possible for global rice production to outpace global demand, but a rice import-dependent

country like the Philippines realized its vulnerability to policy shifts and price

fluctuations in the international trade market. As a consequence, President Benigno

Aquino III along with his Secretary of Agriculture Proceso Alcala created a program that

would augment the Philippines’ right to control or define its own food system. The

Philippine government implemented the national Food Staples Sufficiency Program

(FSSP) in 2011 in order to prevent the Philippine economy from being subjected to the

adverse impacts felt during the crisis.

 Wiedemann 4

PARAGOS3, a non-governmental organization (NGO) in the Philippines that

consists of peasant farmers, felt the FSSP was reminiscent of the Green Revolution that

ultimately contributed to the lack of food sovereignty for the Philippines in the first place

(Tadeo, Baladad, Yanny, 2012). The “Green Revolution” was a term coined by William

S. Gaud, the administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID),

in 1968. The term describes, “the breeding of improved varieties, combined with the

expanded use of fertilizers, other chemical inputs, and irrigation, [which] led to dramatic

yield increases in Asia and Latin America, beginning in the late 1960s,” (IFPRI, 2002, 2).

Since the Philippines’ independence from the United States in 1946, the country was able

to achieve national rice self-sufficiency in the 1970s and 1980s due to the Green

Revolution, but at the cost to the environment and to economic prosperity.

Forty years ago the Green Revolution was successful in producing high yielding

varieties of rice, but the overuse of pesticides and fertilizers depleted the soil of essential

nutrients necessary for sufficient agricultural production. Consequently, the nutrient

deficient soil increased the rate of deforestation as many farmers were forced to clear

forest area in order to make room for agricultural production to keep up with food

demands (GIZ, 2013). Over time, the environmental degradation put many farmers in a

cycle of perpetual poverty as they struggled to produce yields needed to pay off their debt

(Tadeo, Baladad, Yanny, 2012). Given the importance of rice production in the

Philippines, as a major staple food and source of income, the government had to find a

way to stimulate agricultural production and food accessibility.

The Philippines became a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in

1996 hoping to stimulate the economy by opening up the market to international trade.
3
PARAGOS is an acronym for Pagkakaisa para sa Tunay na Repormang Agraryo at Kaunlarang Pangkanayunan.
 Wiedemann 5

The theory born out of multinational food corporations and US led multilateralism4

assumed that industrialized agriculture and advanced technologies would increase

productivity, and deregulation or the exposure of agriculture to international trade would

increase efficiencies leading to higher levels of production at cheaper prices (Broad,

Cavanagh, 2012). However, the Philippine Rice Crisis of 2008 proved this theory wrong.

While consumers benefited from cheaper prices, small-scale farmers could not compete

with heavily subsidized industrialized agriculture. This meant it was cheaper for Filipino

consumers to purchase rice imports than to procure rice from domestic farmers.

The problem lies within the dynamics of the global food system, which impedes

some national governments from equitable participation. Supranational trade

organizations and multinational food corporations that benefit from an open trading

regime at the expense of poor countries dominate the global food system. Professor

Walden Bello at the University of the Philippines Diliman argues that the asymmetry of

the global food system was a result of the predominant neoliberal paradigm.

Neoliberalism is a perspective that champions the market as the prime regulator of

economic activity and seeks to limit the intervention of the state in economic life
to a minimum. Neoliberalism in recent times has become identified with
economics, given its hegemony as a paradigm within the discipline, that is, it’s
excluding of other perspectives as legitimate ways of doing economics. (Bello,
2009, paper presented at the National Conference of the Philippine Sociological
Society)

The deregulation of international trade to boost privatization forced many WTO

members, such as the Philippines, to either push for national staple food self-sufficiency

at a high production cost that leads to increased food prices, or subject peasant farmers to

4
John Ruggie professor of human rights and international affairs at Harvard University defines multilateralism as “an
adjective that modifies the noun institution; it coordinates behavior among three or more states on the basis of
generalized principles of conduct” (Powell, 1993, 5).
 Wiedemann 6

an international market-oriented economy where they have to compete with heavily

subsidized multinational food corporations. This dilemma is an exemplar of the lack of

national food sovereignty within the Philippines.

La Via Campesina is a transnational agrarian movement of peasant and small-

scale farmers from 73 countries in the Americas, Asia and Europe with the goal of

counteracting the WTO and multinational food corporations by empowering farmers and

state governments. This movement launched the concept of “food sovereignty” in

response to the current global food system in the hopes to challenge the status quo. Since

the 1996 World Food Summit held in Rome, La Via Campesina defined food sovereignty

as “the right of each nation to maintain and develop its own capacity to produce its basic

foods, respecting cultural and productive diversity,” (La Via Campesina, 1996).

Another key problem debated among advocates of food sovereignty is the concept

of sustainability. The Brundtland Commission introduced this concept in 1987, which

defined sustainability as “development that meets the needs of the present without

compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs,” (Brundtland,

1987, chapter 2). With regard to ecological sustainability, the future of the global food

system is threatened by population growth coupled with environmental degradation,

natural disasters, and climate change. Without any sustainability efforts, environmental

degradation will further exacerbate the asymmetry of the food system as poor countries

cannot afford adaptation and mitigation technologies, such as genetic modification.

 Wiedemann 7

1.2 Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to consider the case of the Philippines and examine

the implications of maintaining national food sovereignty. Currently, the country is 97

percent rice self-sufficient due to the implementation of the FSSP. However, future

population growth, coupled with depeasantization5, geographic constraints and natural

disasters, pose challenges for sustaining domestic food production.

1.3 Hypothesis and Research Question

Maintaining national food sovereignty is not desirable or suitable for every

country. My thesis examines “why” in the case of the Philippines. The research questions

I pose are as follows:

1) How has the evolution of the global food system impacted food sovereignty

and sustainability in the Philippines?

2) What implications does national food sovereignty have on future

sustainability?

3) What challenges do the Philippines face in maintaining food sovereignty?

5
Depeasantization: the depopulation and decline of the rural areas of the world, particularly in peasant areas. Most
importantly, this implies that fewer farmers will have to provide for more people in non-farm or urban jobs.
http://www.polsci.chula.ac.th/jakkrit/anthro/Rural_Sociology_files/Global%20Depeasantization,.pdf
 Wiedemann 8

1.4 Limitations of the Study

This research focuses on identifying challenges to achieving food sovereignty at

the national level. However, one of the limitations of this study is that these challenges

have unique effects beyond the national level, such as at the household level, local

community level, and international level. Undoubtedly, each of these levels are equally

worthy of examination.

With limited time and funds, I had to conduct this study remotely. It would have

been preferable to conduct my own survey and experience first hand, on-the-ground

realities in the Philippines, instead of relying on second hand data. However, I am

grateful many academics share an interest in the Philippines, which made it possible for

me to complete this study.

1.5 Theoretical Framework

My theoretical framework builds on that of Mairon Giovani Bastos Lima’s master

thesis.6 This framework is a systematic approach to identifying the unique challenges

each country will face in achieving food sovereignty. This framework analyzes the food

system by investigating the roles of the WTO, the World Bank, the International

Monetary Fund (IMF), and national governments on food sovereignty and sustainability.

My framework is summarized in Figure One below.

6
Lima, M. G. L. (2008). “Sustainable Food Security for Local Communities in the Globalized Era: a Comparative
Examination of Brazilian and Canadian Case Studies.” Master’s Thesis. University of Waterloo.
 Wiedemann 9

Figure 1: Summary of Theoretical Framework

 Wiedemann 10

Chapter II: Methodology

2.1 Interest in this topic

I was once a typical recalcitrant Californian child who was told by my parents to

“finish my food because there were starving children in the Philippines.” It was not until I

was ten years old, when my parents sent me to boarding school in the Philippines that I

could fully comprehend why. I stayed at an all girls’ dormitory called Santa Rita College

in Manila that is operated by the Order of Augustinian Recollects. It was positioned

within the walls of San Sebastian Basilica, removed from the city life and “most

importantly” guarded from the poverty outside of those walls. Once in a while, one of the

nuns or college students would take me to the mall. During those trips, I remember seeing

the juxtaposition of a rising metropolitan Manila, and in every nook and cranny an over-

crowded slum dwelling. What provoked me the most were the half naked, emaciated

children who approached our car at the stoplights to beg for money or food. The

prevalence of poverty and hunger in Manila was overwhelming for a young girl raised in

California, and it was forever implanted in my memories.

Twenty years later, I had traveled all over the world and somehow I was always

confronted with poverty and hunger, such as in Bangkok, Rio de Janeiro and Cape Town.

The slum dwellings and hunger were reminiscent of Manila, which was a contrast from

growing up in California. California is the fifth largest producer of food in the world, and

so much of it is wasted. For example, I once worked at a brewing company that had the

best food and beer in town, but every night due to U.S. health code policies, decent food

had to be thrown away. Somehow, we created a food system designed to waste food,
 Wiedemann 11

which always made me feel guilty because I was reminded of the starving children in the

Philippines. The asymmetry of my experiences with food and hunger worldwide has

always baffled me, and compelled me to question the current state of our global system.

I began researching food security, food sovereignty, and sustainability through the

International Studies program at the University of San Francisco, and found that the

predominant neoliberal western-style global food system contributed to the prevalence of

worldwide hunger, and food inequities. I decided to pursue the topic for my MA thesis,

so that I could learn more about the influence of neoliberalism on developing countries,

starting with the Philippines.

In 2012, while working at the NASA Ames Research Center my project was

asked to move into the newly built Sustainability Base. The Base was touted as one of the

greenest federal buildings. Dr. Steve Zornetzer, Associate Center Director for NASA

Ames, was inspired to use space technologies and the innovative-spirit of space

exploration to apply it on Earth. Technologies used in space, such as water reclamation7

designed for the International Space Station, were applied to the building making it use

90 percent less potable water than traditional buildings of comparable size. Water

reclamation is just one of the many space technologies we can transform into sustainable

solutions on Earth. The spirit of Sustainability Base has opened my eyes to the possible

sustainable innovations that can be applied to agriculture, particularly as potable water is

scarce in many parts of the world.

7
Michael Flynn, life support and research engineer at NASA Ames Research Center, and his team are constantly
innovating new ways to recycle wastewater into safe, drinking water.
 Wiedemann 12

2.2 Research Strategy and Data Collection

This study examines the implications of retaining food sovereignty in the

Philippines and how the Philippines has implemented the national FSSP in order to meet

its agricultural objectives to reduce dependence on staple food imports, increase food

production, protect local peasant farmers and most importantly promote staple food self-

sufficiency.

In order to conduct this research, I used secondary data. Therefore, I collected

data from multiple sources on each topic in order to avoid biased information. In order to

understand food sovereignty I used articles from academic journals, such as the Journal

of Peasant Studies and the Philippine Journal of Third World Studies. To examine

sustainability, I gathered secondary data from the National Aeronautics and Space

Administration’s (NASA) scientists who used Earth Observing Satellites (EOS) to study

global vegetation, rainfall and climate change patterns. I also collected articles from El

Sevier, the International Journal of Remote Sensing, Environmental Science &

Technology, Development & Change and the Science journal published by the American

Association for the Advancement of Science. For information specific to the Philippines,

I gathered data from international organizations such as the Food and Agriculture

Organization, World Food Programme, International Food Policy Research Institute and

World Bank. I also gathered data from the Philippine Bureau of Agricultural Statistics

(BAS), Philippine Department of Agriculture (DOA), Philippine Atmospheric,

Geophysical & Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) and the Philippine

Regional Federation of Farmers (PARAGOS).

 Wiedemann 13

The literature review presented in the following chapter discusses the evolution of

the global food system, and the concepts of food sovereignty and sustainability. In

chapter IV, I review the history, background and agriculture of the Philippines and

particularly how the colonization of Spain and the United States dictated the country’s

economic development. In chapter V, I present five criteria for food sovereignty and use

them to identify the challenges the Philippines has in maintaining national staple food

self-sufficiency. In Chapter VI, I investigate the three key themes of this paper socio-

economic, environmental, and cultural and educational subjects. In the conclusion, I

summarize my argument and recommendation to the Philippine government.

 Wiedemann 14

Chapter III: Review of the Literature

3.1 Literature on Food Sovereignty

This chapter reviews the academic and gray literature on food sovereignty and

identifies five criteria for investigating the merits of food sovereignty in the Philippines.

First, I outline the evolution of the global food system and examine the current

asymmetry of the system as a consequence of neoliberalism. Next, I present the concept

of food sovereignty as a reaction to the current state of the global food system. Third, I

frame the debate that surrounds the concept of food sovereignty and address the three key

themes: (1) national self-sufficiency; (2) the “peasant” farmer and; (3) the right of

democratic choice.

3.1.1 State of the Global Food System

Figure 2: Diagram of a Food System

A food system incorporates everything necessary to feed people, from farm to

table: production, distribution, processing, consumption and waste. The current neoliberal

food system is linear, which “assumes that the Earth has an endless supply of natural

resources at one end, and a limitless capacity to absorb waste and pollution at the other,”
 Wiedemann 15

(IIED, 2012, 1).8 This linear system perpetuates a perilous global food system. The rise of

human induced environmental degradation and the threat of increasing climate change

brought on by industrialized agriculture have led many critics to question the assumptions

underlying large scale monocultures. Other scholars argue that small-scale peasant

farming is incapable of keeping up with a growing global population. I address this

debate later in this section. First, I address how the global food system emerged, and how

the model of industrialized agriculture emerged.

After World War I, the Health Division of the League of Nations9 conducted the

first survey of the global state of health and submitted the Nutrition and Public Health

report. “The report showed that there was an acute food shortage in the poor countries,

the first account of the extent of hunger and malnutrition in the world,” (Simon, 2012,

10). Simultaneously, the United States had started investing in domestic agriculture. By

the late 1930s, hybrid seeds of staple food crops, such as corn, were widely used by

American farmers since on average they yielded 40 bushels per acre, compared to the

conventional 20 bushels per acre in the 1920s (Pollan, 2006, 37). As U.S. food stocks

piled up, world prices for food commodities fell. At the same time the Great Depression,

a severe worldwide economic crisis that originated in the United States due to the stock

market crash of 1929, also devastated international trade. To address this deficit the U.S.

Congress passed the 1933 Agricultural Adjustment Act. It allowed the U.S. government

to offer cheaper agricultural exports by subsidizing staple crops, such as corn and wheat,

which spearheaded U.S. dominance over the international trade market. (Simon, 2012,

10)

8
IIED. (2012). Fair and sustainable food systems: from vicious cycles to virtuous cycles. Accessed on November 30th.
<http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/17133IIED.pdf>
9
The League of Nations was established in 1935 to deal with world affairs.
 Wiedemann 16

After World War II, the United Nations (UN) established the Food and

Agriculture Organization (FAO)10, which conducted its first World Food Survey in 1946.

The FAO stated, “to achieve the [nutritional] targets in 1960 (with an assumed 35 percent

population increase) would require an overall [food] increase of 90 percent,” (McMillan,

1946, 375). Simultaneously, the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference of

1944, held in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, had an agenda to “restructure

international finance, establish a multilateral trading system, and construct a framework

for economic cooperation that would avoid a repeat of the Great Depression of the

1930s,” (Moyo, 2010,10). This conference established the World Bank, the International

Monetary Fund (IMF), and the International Trade Organization. Their goals were to

promote worldwide economic stability and forestall any possible global financial crisis.

With that said, Europe had difficulty recovering from World War II, which stalled

global financial growth. Therefore under the Marshall Plan, the United States invested

$20 Billion USD (over $100 Billion USD today) in aid to fourteen European countries.

Aid helped reconstruct Europe, but most notably it established U.S. hegemony over

worldwide foreign policy and US-led multilateralism (Moyo, 2010, 10).

According to research by the non-profit Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

(IATP), food aid in the United States became a multifaceted tool to dominate the global

food system. First, aid was used as a tool to win the Cold War against the USSR and

spread capitalism globally. Second, foreign aid was a new outlet for U.S. to get rid of

surplus staple crops, such as corn (IATP, 2005, 3). Third, “governments that accepted

U.S. food aid programs sacrificed their own agricultural sectors, and their peasantry, in

exchange for subsidized food imports . . . and developed new tastes among the (largely)
10
The United Nations replaced the League of Nations near the end of World War II.
 Wiedemann 17

urban consumers,” (IATP, 2005, 3). For example, in the 1970s and 1980s the Philippine

economy spiraled down due to poor management and reliance on foreign funds coupled

with government corruption and the institution of martial law.

The availability and easy access of relatively low-interest external credit during
the 1970s and the country’s heavy reliance on foreign funds for financing its
growth strategies before 1983 resulted in a sharp rise in the overall level of
external debt . . . Total debt rose from $13 billion at the end of 1979 to $29 billion
at the end of 1989. (Solon, Floro, 1993, 4)

During this economic crisis the Philippines received soybean meal (used to feed

livestock) under U.S. food aid, but by the 1990s the Philippines became the leading

purchaser of soybean meal, where 90 percent came from the U.S.11

The Green Revolution that began in the 1960s provided an opportunity for

agricultural economic growth in developing countries. The Rockefeller and Ford

Foundations established an international agricultural research system in hopes of

alleviating hunger and dependence on foreign aid by bringing modern agricultural

scientific research to developing countries (IFPRI, 2002, 1). Norman Borlaug, the father

of the Green Revolution and a future Nobel Peace Prize laureate, was able to produce

high-yielding varieties (HYVs) that matured quicker, grew at any time of the year, and

were resistant to major pests and diseases.12 In 1960, the Rockefeller and Ford

Foundations established the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in Southeast

Asia to develop HYVs of rice. From 1975 to 1990, staple crop production increased by

nearly 30 percent per person in Asia. Wheat and rice became cheaper, and poverty

declined from nearly three out of five Asians in 1975 to less than one in three by 1995

(IFPRI, 2002, 3).

11
Shah, A. (2007). Food Aid. Accessed on September 19, 2014. <http://www.globalissues.org/article/748/food-aid>
12
Borlaug won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his work with developing HYVs of corn in Mexico.
 Wiedemann 18

While the evolution of our global food system has increased food productivity and

international trade, it still has not eradicated hunger or food insecurity. In 1996,

representatives of 185 countries gathered at the World Food Summit in Rome, Italy to

address food insecurity. After five years, they established an Intergovernmental Working

Group to develop a definition and guidelines that governments can utilize to achieve

national food security. In 2004, the FAO’s “Right to Food Guidelines” adopted this

definition, which became the widely used definition of food security. The definition

states “food security exists when all people at all times have access to sufficient, safe,

nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences to maintain a healthy and

active life,” (FAO, 2005). The “right to food” does not obligate governments to hand out

free food, but governments are encouraged to address the four dimensions of food

security: availability, access, utilization, and stability.

• Availability is the availability of sufficient quantities of food of appropriate

quality, supplied through domestic production or imports (including food aid).
• Access is by individuals to adequate resources for acquiring appropriate foods
for a nutritious diet.
• Utilization is of food through adequate diet, clean water, sanitation and health
care to reach a state of nutritional wellbeing where all physiological needs are
met. This brings out the importance of non-food inputs in food security.
• Stability is to be food secure, a population, household or individual must have
access to adequate food at all times, and should not risk losing access to food
as a consequence of sudden shocks (e.g. an economic or climatic crisis) or
cyclical events (e.g. seasonal food insecurity).13

The concept of food insecurity as reported by international agencies actually does

not measure food insecurity per se rather it measures undernourishment. The FAO

defines undernourishment as, “a state, lasting for at least one year, of inability to acquire

enough food, defined as a level of food intake insufficient to meet dietary energy

13
FAO. (2006). Policy brief: Food security. <http://www.fao.org/forestry/13128-
0e6f36f27e0091055bec28ebe830f46b3.pdf>
 Wiedemann 19

requirements. (2014). The FAO, the International Fund for Agricultural Development

(IFAD), and the World Food Programme (WFP) produce an annual report titled The State

of Food Insecurity in the World. Since the introduction of the Millennium Development

Goals (MDGs) in 2002, the food insecurity report has been recording successful

reductions in worldwide undernourishment. MDG Target One aims to reduce extreme

hunger by half by 2015 compared to the 1990 statistics. In 199014, 19.8 percent of the

world’s populations was suffering from extreme undernourishment and by 201415 it was

almost halved at 11 percent. However, Asia still contains the highest numbers of

undernourished due to its high population rate, at 525.6 million (Sixty-five percent of the

world’s food insecure live in Asia).

3.1.2 Contemporary Debate on Small-Scale versus Large-Scale Farming

Figure 3: Small-Scale versus Large-Scale Farming Debate Spectrum

Investments in modern agriculture and the Green Revolution have made it

possible to produce enough food for everyone, but investments in modern agriculture

such as in genetically modified technologies (GMs) are expensive, so developed

14
According to the United States Census, the world population in 1990 was 5,287,869,228.
15
According to the United States Census, the world population in 2013 was 7,098,495,231.
 Wiedemann 20

countries and multinational food corporations had a leg up in dominating the global food

system. Some academics and policymakers posit that environmental and social inequities

were by-products of the Green Revolution as a result of the expansion of large-scale

farming, which “resulted in environmental degradation, increased income inequality,

inequitable asset distribution, and worsened absolute poverty,” (IFPRI, 2002, 3). Since

more investments in agriculture will be needed to meet the growing demands of a world

population expected to reach nine billion people by 2050, what method of food

production can meet future requirements? Currently, there is heated debate between

advocates for large-scale versus those for small-scale farming, over which model can

keep up with the future demand for food, while also minimizing worldwide

undernourishment, environmental degradation and social inequities.

Paul Collier, an economist from Oxford University and author of Plundered

Planet, argues that only large-scale commercial farming can meet the growing demand

for food. He addresses the need for improvement in agricultural technologies and

infrastructure that many developing countries lack.

Reluctant peasants are right: the mode of production is ill-suited to modern

agricultural production where scale is helpful. Technology is constantly evolving;
investment is lumpy; consumer food fashions are fast-changing and met by
integrated marketing chains; and regulatory standards are rising toward the Holy
Grail of traceability of produce back to source. All the modern developments are
better suited to large, commercial organizations. (Collier, 2010, 213)

For example, the Philippines had four million hectares (ha) of rice crops, which provided

rice to more than two million households throughout the country (Tadeo, Baladad, 2012),

which is not enough to supplement its demand as the Philippines is the largest importer of

rice in the world. The problem is that while 30 percent of the country’s land is used for

agricultural production, only 58 percent of that potentially arable land is suitable due to
 Wiedemann 21

agricultural constraints (Briones, 2005), such as poor infrastructure or soil nutrient

deficiency. In addition, the percentage of Filipinos living in cities and urban areas will

increase from 50 percent in 2013 to 84 percent by 2050 (UN Habitat, 2013).

Depeasantization means that fewer farmers will have to provide for more people in non-

farm or urban jobs. In order to achieve national rice self-sufficiency the Philippines

would have to overcome agricultural constraints as well as a dwindling peasant labor

force.

Collier also argues that demand from burgeoning middle-income consumers in

developing countries will boost “nutrition transition.” The World Health Organization

(WHO) defines nutrition transition as, “the increasing consumption of fats, sweeteners,

energy-dense foods, and highly processed foods compared to traditional diets

characterized by higher intake of cereals,” (WHO, 2007, 9). “Energy-dense foods”

largely include meat. China successfully met their Millennium Development Goals

(MDG) target one in 2002 when it reduced food insecurity to seven percent from 17

percent in 1990.16 Its success was due to lifting 600 million people out of poverty in the

last 30 years.17 The increase in income growth has made it possible for Chinese to

consume more meat, but the demand for livestock also requires an increase or

reallocation of grains as, “it takes six kilos of grain to produce one kilo of beef,” (Collier,

2011, 210). The National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) reports that domestic and

overseas livestock, poultry and pork consume almost 40 percent of all corn grown in the

US (NCGA, 2013, 11).

16
FAO. 40th Anniversary of Collaboration Between the People’s Republic of China and FAO. 2 December 2013.
<http://www.fao.org/about/who-we-are/director-gen/faodg-statements/detail/en/c/209223/>
17
Shih, T.H. (2013). China’s formula to reduce poverty could help developing nations. Accessed on November 23,
2014. <http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1202142/chinas-formula-reduce-poverty-could-help-developing-
nations>
 Wiedemann 22

Activist Vendana Shiva, author of Making Peace With the Earth is a key advocate

of small-scale organic farming and a critic of Collier. Shiva argues that big agribusinesses

are robbing locals of their capacity to earn fair wages for the purpose of maximizing the

corporate “bottom line.”

The global corporate economy based on the idea of limitless growth has become a
permanent war economy against the planet and people. The means are instruments
of war; coercive free trade treaties used to organize economies on the basis of
trade wars; and technologies of production based on violence and control, such as
toxins, genetic engineering, geo-engineering, and nano-technologies. (Shiva,
2012, 3)

She argues that small-scale farming successfully fed villages long before their

introduction into the world trade system. As she points out, small-scale farms today are

still responsible for producing four-fifths of the food available in developing countries,

and by far the biggest source of employment in the world (IFPRI, 2013, 2).

Fred Magdoff and Brian Tokar, authors of Agriculture and Food In Crisis:

Conflict, Resistance, and Renewal agree with Shiva and further argue that the myth of the

“free market” has made it easier for United States agribusinesses like Monsanto, Cargill,

and DuPont to gain global competitive advantage, which has brought economic hardship

to low income countries (2010, 15).

The Washington Consensus, an ideology developed by the advanced capitalist

countries, especially the United States, continues to promote the myths of ‘free
markets’ and ‘free trade.’ The dogma holds that if restrictions on markets are
eliminated, both within a country and between countries, market forces will work
their magic and efficiently allocate resources. (Magdoff, Tokar, 2010, 17)

One example is the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which was

signed in 1994 by 117 countries, including the Philippines.

The [Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry] believes that member

countries stand to benefit from the unquantifiable results of [GATT]. New rules
for shipment and customs, more transparency in trade, and a better way of settling
 Wiedemann 23

disputes all contribute to a more predictable trading system . . . When tariffs are
cut in developed countries and, more importantly, in developing countries,
domestic industries are exposed to competition. This shifts resources to more
efficient uses, which will boost productivity and living standards . . . it is believed
that new deal will provide more access for products such as electronics and
agricultural products to the markets of the country’s major trading partners. (The
Philippine Chamber of Commerce, 1994, 59)

Rafael Mariano, Chair of Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP), a peasant farmers

organization in the Philippines, argues that the GATT is causing the Philippines to be

highly dependent on imports of staple food and that it contributes to the country’s 2001

loss of $3.5 billion in foreign trade (Mariano, 2001, 1).

“Ironically, private ownership has led to an even more centralized and tightly

controlled food system,” (Magdoff, et al, 2010, p. 103). Today, agribusinesses have

created an asymmetrical control of agricultural production throughout the world, where

the top four or five agribusinesses control between 40 to 80 percent of staple

commodities such as rice, wheat and maize (p. 158). Stuckler and Nestle label them as

“Big Food” actors, which refers to the top ten multinational food and beverage

corporations that control more than half of all food sales (Stuckler, Nestle, 2012, 1).

Vandana Shiva’s second argument is that the intensiveness of large-scale farming

is causing environmental degradation and loss of crop diversity as a result of

privatization, commodification and monopolization by multinational food corporations.

In the United States, large-scale farming with monocultures (e.g. the corn belt) have

depleted nutrients in soils increasing the need for fertilizers, pesticides and fungicides.

For example, in California extensive commercial agriculture is the major source of nitrate

pollution in 100,000 square miles of polluted groundwater (NRDC, 2013). Livestock

releases 18 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, which is more than that of the
 Wiedemann 24

transportation sector (FAO, 2006, xxi). In the Philippines, the Green Revolution was very

successful in producing HYVs 40 years ago, but at the cost of human health and

environmental damage. “Over the years, farmers became overly dependent on the use of

chemical fertilizers and pesticides . . . eventually disregarded the natural regeneration of

nutrients within the soil,” (Tadeo, Baladad, 2012, 5). The paradox is that not only will

agriculture contribute to climate change, but climate change will also affect agricultural

productivity.

3.1.3 Food Sovereignty

As stated earlier, La Via Campesina is a transnational agrarian movement of

peasant and small-scale farmers from 73 countries in the Americas, Asia and Europe to

counteract the WTO and big agribusinesses in the hopes of empowering citizens, farmers

and states. This movement launched the concept of “food sovereignty” to counteract the

current state of the global food system in the hopes of challenging the status quo. Since

the 1996 World Food Summit held in Rome, La Via Campesina defined food sovereignty

as “the right of each nation to maintain and develop its own capacity to produce its basic

foods, respecting cultural and productive diversity,” (La Via Campesina, 1996). The

proclamation was further defined at the Nyéléni, Mali Forum for Food Sovereignty in

2007.

Food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food
produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to
define their own food and agriculture systems. It puts the aspirations and needs of
those who produce, distribute and consume food at the heart of food systems and
policies, rather than the demands of markets and corporations. It offers a strategy
to resist and dismantle the current corporate and food regime . . . It defends the
interests and inclusion of the next generation . . . Food sovereignty prioritises
local and national economies and markets, and empowers peasant and family
 Wiedemann 25

farmer-driven agriculture . . . It ensures . . . the rights to use and manage lands . . .

[It] implies new social relations free of oppression and inequality between men
and women, peoples, racial groups, social and economic classes and generations.
(Agarwal, 2014, p. 1248)

Eighteen years later, “the notion is still being used and continues to evolve through the

different groups that make use of it,” (Issaoui-Mansouri, 2011, 12). The concept of food

sovereignty has encouraged farmers and consumers to express their frustrations with the

current state of the global food system. While La Via Campesina’s influence has grown,

its focus on food sovereignty has also led to challenges in the meaning and implications

of the concept.

The evolution of food sovereignty was the outcome of a bottom-up approach

launched by La Via Campesina. Advocates of food sovereignty all aim to deter Big Food

actors and supranational controls over the global food system.

Over the past 20 to 30 years in rural areas of the world, as neoliberal economic
policies began cutting back, and in many cases eliminating, the institutions that
supported peasant and family agriculture, the legitimacy of national government
policies, political parties, and international financial institutions was eroded in the
eyes of peasant and family farmers . . . In the neoliberal era, supranational
corporations and institutions dictating neoliberal policies have negatively affected
most sectors of society. One of the consequences of this is that class or cultural
differences are no longer the barrier they once were for transnational collective
action . . . They have globalized their struggles from below, by forming La Via
Campesina (literally, ‘the peasant way’). In doing so, they have envisioned a
simultaneously new and old ‘agrarian trajectory that would reintegrate food
production and nature as an alternative culture of modernity. (Martinez-Torres,
Rosset, 2010, 150)

Ever since the Bretton Woods Conference, supranational trade organizations and Big

Food actors such as the WTO and Monsanto have increasingly dominated the global food

system, which has transformed the role of the nation-state in rural areas, particularly in

developing counties. These state governments, especially since their adoption of the

GATT and structural adjustment programs, increasingly grew interested in importing

 Wiedemann 26

cheaper industrialized food products, and decreasingly interested in procuring food from

domestic farmers.

However, by the 1980s and 1990s, developing countries found themselves

cornered by these agreements and programs. First, the WTO and the North American

Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), made it hard for small-scale farmers to sell staple crops

amidst heavily subsidized farmers in industrialized developed countries. Second, the

World Bank and IMF instituted structural adjustment programs that required budget-cuts

and free market policies for debtor countries reliant on foreign funds or foreign aid.

Third, “this came on top of the displacement [of peasant farmers] that had already

occurred under World Bank, USAID, and Green Revolution-driven, forced-pace

‘modernization’ in the immediately preceding period of time,” (Martinez-Torres, Rosset,

2010, 153). As mentioned earlier, Mariano argues that the GATT/WTO is causing the

Philippines to be highly rice import-dependent. While the Philippines exported 8.25

million metric tons (MT) of banana, pineapple and mango from 1995 to 1999, it also

imported 4.74 million MT of rice in the same time period.18

Peasant farmers were the most impacted by these agreements and programs. “In

the 1980s and 1990s the greatest problem peasant organizations faced was the rapid

decline of crop and livestock prices,” (Martinez-Torres, Rosset, 2010, 153), and

depeasantization. For example, as the Philippines invested more in industrialized

agriculture to keep up with demands in the international trade market, landlords

implementing modern agricultural technologies were replacing peasant farmers.

18
Mariano, Rafael. (2001). Philippines Agri Lost $3.5 Billion in Foreign Trade Under GATT in Five Years. Accessed
on November 7, 2014. <http://www.gene.ch/gentech/2001/Aug/msg00299.html>
 Wiedemann 27

In one case, Jeremias Montemayor a law student and the son of a wealthy

landowning family in Pangasinan, Philippines witnessed his mother evicting her tenant

peasant farmers. His mother had invested in modern agricultural technologies and no

longer needed the tenants who cared for the land. That event concluded with Montemayor

representing the evicted tenants, against his mother. Eventually, he sought the help of

other lawyers and the Institute of Social Order19 (ISO) to establish a peasant organization

called the Federation of Free Farmers (FFF). Montemayor believed the peasants were at a

disadvantage and wanted to make sure they were properly represented within the

government.

Unfortunately, even with the help of organizations like the FFF, politicians,

activists and peasant farmers continued to experience inequities and realized they needed

direct representation. Worldwide, many farmers faced similar problems and realized they

were all up against the same supranational organizations and multinational food

corporations. Consequently, La Via Campesina differentiated itself as a grassroots-based

peasant movement, organized for peasant farmers, by peasant farmers.

La Via Campesina organized protests and public debates worldwide, particularly

in reaction to the WTO. They “began to make a ‘splash’ at prominent anti-globalisation

protests, such as in Seattle during the 1999 WTO protests,” (Martinez-Torres, 2010, 159).

As of November 2014, La Via Campesina has 164 organizations in 73 countries,20

representing more than 500 million rural families worldwide. Every three to four years,

representatives gather at the International Conference to “engage in a collective analysis

19
“The ISO, which was established by the Jesuit priest in 1947 to disseminate Catholic social doctrine and apply it to
community problems,” (Kimura, 2006, 7).
20
Via Campesina. (2013). La Via Campesina Members. Accessed on November 30th, 2014
<http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/organisation-mainmenu-44/our-members-mainmenu-71>
 Wiedemann 28

of what is occurring in agriculture at the global level and defines plans for joint action

and advocacy at the international level,” (Martinez-Torres, Rosset, 2010, 165).

However, as more organizations contribute to, and expand, the principles of this

movement “there can be serious contradictions between the key features of the food

sovereignty vision,” (Agarwal, 2014, 1248). Food sovereignty includes contradictions

ranging from sustainable methods to acknowledging the rights of producers, consumers

and distributors. According to Bina Agarwal, President of the International Society for

Ecological Economics21 and an award-winning author, “the concept of ‘food sovereignty’

has gained increasing ground among grassroots groups . . . But there is no uniform

conceptualization of what food sovereignty constitutes. Indeed the definition has been

expanding over time,” (Agarwal, 2014, p. 1247). For example, this movement has

evolved from advocating for national self-sufficiency to local self-sufficiency, and

principles fluctuate between bottom-up to top-down approaches. Below I list the main

principles of this movement, and address some principles as they pertain to the

Philippines more extensively.22

Production
• The domination of Big Food actors such as Monsanto and supranational
organizations like the WTO favor industrial agriculture, at the expense of
subsistence agriculture. This forces many developing countries to be import-
dependent and ultimately susceptible to price fluctuations, and susceptible to any
changes in the import structure of staple commodities.
• The power of Big Food actors and supranational organizations encourages
quantity, at the expense of quality.
• The growing power of Big Food actors and supranational organizations empower
large-scale farmers, leaving many peasant/small-scale farmers displaced by either:
(a) lack of subsidies (b) or land grabs.

21
“ISEE is a not-for-profit, member-governed, organization dedicated to advancing understanding of the relationships
among ecological, social, and economic systems for the mutual well-being of nature and people.”
http://www.isecoeco.org
22
See also Edelman et al. (2014). Introduction: critical perspectives on food sovereignty. The Journal of Peasant
Studies, 41:6, 911-931.
 Wiedemann 29

• The right to food is a basic human right; therefore food should not be treated like
other commodities, such as electronics.
• Big Food actors can afford expensive technology, such as GM technologies,
giving them a leg up on dominating the global food system.

Distribution
• Big Food actors, exclusively do business with industrial farms. “Advocates say
that this relationship between “big fishes” is threatening biodiversity because
those farms usually grow standardized crops,” (Issaoui-Mansouri, 2011, 15).
• A labeling system that requires Big Food actors to state where food comes from
and whether it is genetically modified.

Consumption
• Consumers need to be aware of what is at stake, from production to consumption,
when they purchase food.
• Consumers have the power to influence key policies that promote sustainability-
based food sovereignty. (Agarwal, 2014; Edelman et al, 2014; Issaoui-Mansouri,
2011, 15)

In her article, “Food Sovereignty, Food Security and Democratic Choice: Critical

Contradictions, Difficult Conciliations,” Agarwal argues that “food sovereignty goals

could be better achieved through innovative institutional change, without sacrificing an

individual’s freedom to choose,” (2014, 1248). Her article best frames the overarching

themes on food sovereignty and I use her insights as a basis for my analysis.

National Self-Sufficiency

The goal of self-sufficiency at the national level . . . has resonance as a means of

reducing vulnerabilities arising from the over-dependency of food importing
countries on food exporting ones. Much of the developing world depends on food
imports from the developed world and a few developing countries for fulfilling its
food needs. Given the uncertainties arising from such dependence, rising and
volatile food prices, and the effects of climate change, national efforts to achieve
some degree of food sufficiency and move towards low chemical,
environmentally sustainable agriculture . . . clearly appear desirable, although not
all countries can or may want to aim at full sufficiency. (Agarwal, 2014, 1255)
 Wiedemann 30

Magdoff et al define “The Great Hunger of 2008” as a time when food insecurity

spiked because staple foods such as corn, wheat and rice doubled or tripled in a short

period. As we have seen, the price of rice globally almost tripled between 2007 and 2008

(Regalado, 2010, 22). The sudden increase in rice prices had the largest impact on

import-dependent countries, such as the Philippines. According to the World Rice

Statistics, the Philippines was the largest global importer of rice in 2008, importing

almost 1.8 million tons.23 At the same time, a few Asian countries were producing 90

percent of global rice production. The regional concentration of rice production meant the

Philippines was over-dependent on a few countries for fulfilling its needs. Most

importantly, this meant that the Philippines was vulnerable to any policy shifts and price

fluctuations. For instance, during “The Great Hunger of 2008” many countries refused to

export rice, and this pushed the Philippines to raise their tariffs in order to avoid rice

shortages.

According to Aurora Regalado, managing trustee of the Management and

Organizational Development for Empowerment (MODE)24, the Philippine dependence on

rice during this crisis was a wake-up call. As a consequence, the Philippine government

implemented the National FSSP, also known as the rice self-sufficiency plan. As stated

earlier, farmer organizations and civil society groups criticized this initiative because it

was reminiscent of the structural adjustment program that ultimately contributed to the

lack of food sovereignty in the Philippines in the first place (Bello, 2009, 56).

Achieving national rice self-sufficiency requires the Philippines to work with

limited arable land, and rural farmers would have to produce a large enough surplus to
23
IRRI. Why does the Philippines import rice? Accessed on November 30th, 2014. <http://irri.org/news/hot-topics/why-
does-the-philippines-import-rice>
24
“MODE is a non-stock, non-profit organization, integrated on April 27, 1992 under Philippine law.”
<http://www.aidphilippines.com/2011/06/20/management-and-organizational-development-of-empowerment-mode/>
 Wiedemann 31

supply a growing urban population. Agricultural economist Nicomedes Briones reports

that although a third of Philippines’ total land area is used for agriculture, only 58 percent

of that potentially arable land is sufficient for agricultural production (2005, p. 67). In

addition, the Philippines has a population growth rate of almost two percent a year, but

the percentage of Filipinos living in cities and urban areas will increase from 50 percent

in 2013 to 84 percent by 2050 (UN Habitat, 2013). This means the Philippines would

have to overcome farming insufficiencies in order to feed a growing urban population.

Otherwise, if the population surpasses the country’s ability to produce then food

insecurity will increase as food availability thins.

For increasing production, two contrasting models are being mooted globally with
divergent visions of agrarian transitions. One vision privileges large corporate
farms feeding a growing number of city dwellers. The other envisions the vast
body of small and marginal farmers enhancing their productivity and making a
smooth transition from agriculture to non-agriculture, or choosing to stay in
agriculture as an attractive livelihood option. (Agarwal, 2014, 1251)

La Via Campesina agrees with the latter model, but there are many problems in

achieving this goal. Not every nation, particularly geographically small countries like the

Philippines, has sufficient natural or economic resources to keep up with growing

demands. Consequently, these countries will have to depend on long-distance trade,

which raises questions about the concept of “food miles.”25 Opponents of long-distance

trade are concerned with the environmental impacts of food. According to the Natural

Resources Defense Council (NRDC), “in 2005, the import of fruits, nuts, and vegetables

into California by airplane released more then 70,000 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2),

which is equivalent to more than 12,000 cars on the road,” (NRDC, 2007, 2).

25
Food miles are the distance food travels from where it is grown to where it is ultimately purchased or consumed
(NRDC, 2007, 2). The concept of “food miles” is a highly debated topic as some countries are highly dependent on
food imports due to the lack of sufficient agricultural lands.
 Wiedemann 32

The Right of Democratic Choice

Choosing not to farm for self-sufficiency, choosing not to grow food crops,
choosing not to grow organically – these are all democratic choices, subject to
constraints that farmers face. There can thus be a serious conflict between the
aims of the food sovereignty movement and what many farmers may choose to
do. (Agarwal, 2014, 1259).

The right of democratic choice is one of the greatest challenges of this movement. The

problem lies in a farmer’s right to choose within the boundaries of food sovereignty. As I

will further address in this section, peasant farmers’ choices are constrained by

economical, institutional, environmental and political challenges, where they are often

without alternatives. For example, one of those constraints includes farmers’ ability to

access expensive industrial and genetic modification (GM) technology.

The method of farming is one of the most debated topics among proponents of

food sovereignty. Most proponents believe in sustainable farming methods. However,

sometimes there are constraints that dictate peasants’ agricultural methods, such as the

local environmental conditions. Throughout Southeast Asia, especially in Bangladesh and

the Philippines, flooding is a major concern for many farmers.

The World Bank (2011) states that over time in the Philippines, heavy rainfall
associated with typhoons and other weather systems may increase in both
intensity and frequency under a changing climate and exacerbate the incidence of
flooding in existing flood-prone areas and introduce a risk of flooding to new
areas. (Israel, Briones, 2012, 15).

Thus peasant farmers feel GM technology could be a solution to produce flood resistant

crops, such as scuba rice (IRRI, 2010). The IRRI developed scuba rice, which is a

genetically modified rice variety that can withstand floods for up to two weeks.

According to IRRI, 23 tropical cyclones hit the Philippines in 2008 with total agricultural

damages costing up to PhP12 billion ($269 million USD) (IRRI, 2010, 1).
 Wiedemann 33

Despite opposition to genetically modified seeds by proponents of food

sovereignty, there are small-scale/peasant farmers who appreciate GM. The technology

was introduced in the 1990s. Its novelty calls into question possible negative impacts,

such as human health side effects or harms to the environment. However, some advocates

of food sovereignty believe “fear of the unknown’ is not a reason to reject GMOs,”

(Issaoui-Mansouri, 2011, 15).

There are also cultural constraints, such as gender inequality. Among peasant

farmers, women farmers who are increasingly dominating the farming industry have

fewer rights than their male counterparts, such as the rights to own land or manage the

land. In the Philippines, only 24 percent of females are actively involved in agriculture.

According to Aquatic Agricultural Systems (AAS)26, this low number “globally suggests

that women are somewhat more likely than men to be in vulnerable forms of employment

. . . such as unpaid family labor or subcontracted piece-rate work,” (2012, 6).

The “Peasant” Farmer

National self-sufficiency goals cannot translate simply into local or household

self-sufficiency goals. Nations have to provide for all citizens, many of whom are
in non-farms or urban jobs, and farmers may not make choices that move a
country towards food self-sufficiency. (Agarwal, 2014, 1255-1256)

Defining the “peasant” farmer is another challenge of this movement. The neoliberal food

inequities brought upon local peasant farmers have gained awareness as La Via

Campesina transformed peasants’ rights into a global movement. Henry Bernstein, the

emeritus professor of development studies in the University of London at the School of

26
“The CGIAR Research Program on Aquatic Agricultural Systems (AAS) seeks to reduce poverty and improve food
security for many small-scale fishers and farmers depending on aquatic agriculture systems by partnering with local,
national and international partners to achieve large-scale development impact.” <http://www.aas.cgiar.org/about-
program>
 Wiedemann 34

Oriental and African Studies, illustrates how the “peasant” farmer is depicted as a symbol

of “capital’s other.” “Capitalism versus the peasant” is the injustice of peasant farmers

brought on by multinational food corporations. It is a discourse that dates back to Marx

when the proletariat was unhappy with the current conditions brought on by the

bourgeoisie.

They qualify as capital’s other by virtue of an ensemble of qualities, which

include their sustainable farming principles and practices; their capacity for
collective stewardship of the environments they inhabit (Wittman 2010, 94); their
‘peasant frugality’ (McMichael 2010, 176); and ‘their vision of autonomy,
diversity and cooperation’ versus the dependence, standardisation and
competition imposed on farming by ‘the forces of capital and the market’ (Bello
and Bavieri 2010, 74). They are the bearers of ‘indigenous technologies’ that
‘often reflect a worldview and an understanding of our relationship to the natural
world that is more realistic and sustainable than those of western European
heritage’ (Altieri 2010, 125), and provide the basis for ‘revalorizing rural cultural-
ecology as a global good’ (McMichael 2006, 472). While ‘indigenous’ seems
virtually synonymous with the ‘traditional’ in Altieri’s agroecological perspective
(2008, 2010), McMichael (2010, 175-7) emphasizes the capacity of peasants to
adapt to changing circumstances (in his examples, their ingenuity in ‘climate
proofing’ in arid environments). All these and other such qualities combine to
represent, or express, a radically different episteme to that centred in market
relations and dynamics, an ‘alternative modernity’ to that of capitalist agriculture
based in an ecologically wise and socially just rationality (McMichael 2009).
(Bernstein, 2013, 12)

Academics such as Collier, Bernstein, and Agarwal are skeptical of peasants being at the

forefront of food sovereignty, especially as member organizations of La Via Campesina

are diverse with competing interests. Further, peasant farmers are incapable of making

vast changes when they are up against supranational organizations and multinational food

corporations. Most importantly, there is a growing disinterest in small-scale farming as

more and more peasant farmers are being pulled to urban life or industrialized

agriculture.
 Wiedemann 35

Proponents of food sovereignty with a bottom-up approach believe the current

neoliberal food inequities are either evidence of the government’s disinterest in their

peasants’ needs or they are constrained by external forces, such as the WTO, which

incapacitates the governments’ ability to help. Food sovereignty proponents with a top-

down approach argue that the state should be accountable for implementing policies that

reflect the interests of all its citizens.

The state government has the authority to carry out policies, and to regulate and
enforce law. Therefore, any efficient policy promoting food sovereignty
principles would have to be implemented at the state level; otherwise, it would be
too weak to have a noteworthy impact on society (Paré, 2009). (Issaoui-Mansouri,
2011, 12).

Hence, who should be the leader in addressing food sovereignty (Edelman et al, 2014)?

Who are the “peasant” farmers? This depends on whom you ask. There are as many

answers as there are people in this world, and those answers change given the specific

constraints, challenges and conditions. Agarwal argues that it is important to identify the

constraints that dictate peasant farmers’ actions, be it economic, cultural, political, or

environmental (2014).

In this literature section, I have shown how the asymmetry of our global food

system has evolved. Developed countries with industrialized agriculture, supranational

trade organizations and multinational food corporations have created a system where they

benefit from an international open trading regime, but at the expense of poor countries.

Even though industrialized agriculture has made it possible to outpace global demands, I

have demonstrated how the Green Revolution has led to environmental degradation, and

increased income inequality and poverty. This has led to the contemporary debate on
 Wiedemann 36

small-scale versus large-scale farming, and which method can keep up with the growing

global demand for food, while minimizing the adverse impacts brought on by the Green

Revolution.

An outcome of the current state of the global food system is the food sovereignty

movement, led by La Via Campesina. The concept of achieving food sovereignty is ideal.

However, critics such as Agarwal and Bernstein believe achieving food sovereignty is

unrealistic as there are environmental, political and economic constraints at the local and

national level. This section is important to my argument because it demonstrates how the

current neoliberal Western style of our global food system is perpetuating food inequities

in poor countries.

In the following section I discuss how environmental degradation, the negative

impacts of climate change and natural disasters will exacerbate the current inequities of

the global food system. This section further demonstrates how food sovereignty is not the

best approach for the Philippines due to these adverse environmental impacts.
 Wiedemann 37

3.2 Literature on Sustainability

This section reviews the academic and gray literature on “sustainability

development, where development meets the needs of the present without compromising

the ability of future generations to meet their own needs,” (Brundtland, 1987, chap. 1,

para. 10). I frame the debates on development approaches to analyze the current state of

sustainability in the Philippines. First, I outline the evolution of sustainability from the

Brundtland Commission to Agroecology. Secondly, I outline the indicators, causes and

impacts of climate change.

3.2.1 Evolution of Sustainability

Astronomer Carl Sagan asked NASA to have the Voyager 1 space probe to take a

picture of Earth just before leaving our Solar System. The outcome was a depiction of

Earth as a fraction of a pixel against the vastness of space. This image has become widely

known as the Pale Blue Dot.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience.

There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this
distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal
more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the
only home we’ve ever known. (Sagan, 1994, 32)

The World Commission on Environment and Development of 1983, better known as the

Brundtland Commission, was an effort made by the United Nations to address sustainable

development. Many sustainable development efforts today are predisposed to follow the

principles that were outlined in Our Common Future, a report that was the outcome of

this commission. The vision of Earth from space has inspired both Carl Sagan and the

Commission to save the only planet we know so far to harbor life.

 Wiedemann 38

In the middle of the 20th century, we saw our planet from space for the first time.
Historians may eventually find that this vision had a greater impact on thought
than did the Copernican revolution of the 16th century, which upset the human
self-image by revealing that the Earth is not the centre of the universe. From
space, we see a small and fragile ball dominated not by human activity and edifice
but by a pattern of clouds, oceans, greenery, and soils. Humanity’s inability to fit
its activities into that pattern is changing planetary systems, fundamentally. Many
such changes are accompanied by life-threatening hazards. This new reality, from
which there is no escape, must be recognized – and managed. (Brundtland, 1987,
chapter IV)

As the quote states, the profound impact of mankind’s ability to look back at

Earth questions our self-centered being. This is an example of Anthony Gidden’s, author

of The Consequences of Modernity, where the impact of modernity, or advancements in

technology, affect the daily modes of our social being (Giddens, 1991). For example,

when the advancement of agricultural technologies distance us from the negative realities

of where our food comes from. Some of those negative realities are caged chickens or

pigs, deforestation, and food traveling halfway across the world. Agricultural

industrialism and the current global food system have separated us from those realities,

and because of this human’s can consume food “guilt-free”. Thus giving industrialized

agriculture a ticket to exploit nature without having to pay for the negative consequences

to the environment.

Today, industrial agriculture has made it possible for global food production to

outpace increasing global food demands, but the same course is contributing to adverse

effects on the physical environment. In Our Common Future written in 1987, the

Brundtland commission states, “more than 11 million hectares of forests are destroyed

yearly, and this, over three decades, would equal an area about the size of India,”

(Brundtland, chapter I, paragraph 7). In 2011 the FAO reported that due to the increasing

demand for livestock “forests have been cleared from an area the size of India,” (1). In
 Wiedemann 39

1987 the Commission was able to calculate this negative impact. Sulfur dioxide

emissions from manufacturing companies were contributing to acid rain. In addition, the

introduction of extra green house gases (GHGs) into the environment by pumping fossil

fuel out of the ground was leading to global warming. In some areas of the Philippines,

the over use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides had led to soil so nutrient deficient it

could no longer produce rice. These human-induced environmental problems have made

many governments and multilateral institutions realize that it is impossible to think that

economic development can be independent from concerns about adverse impacts on the

environment.

The Commission held public hearings in five continents to hear public testimony.

The outcome of these hearings revolved around one central theme “many present

development trends leave increasing numbers of people poor and vulnerable, while at the

same time degrading the environment,” (Brundtland, 1987, chap. 1, para. 10). This

finding led to the question, “How can such development serve next century’s world of

twice as many people relying on the same environment?” (Brundtland, 1987, chap. 1,

para. 10). In response, the Commission introduced the concept of sustainability and

presented new guidelines.

Sustainability development is development that meets the needs of the present

without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It
contains within it two key concepts:
• the concept of ‘needs’, in particular the essential needs of the world’s poor, to
which overriding priority should be given; and
• the idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social
organization on the environment’s ability to meet present and future needs.
(Brundtland, 1987, chap. 2, para. 1)

This definition of sustainability addresses environmental degradation and social injustice

rather than addressing debates on the merits of industrialized agriculture versus small-
 Wiedemann 40

scale farming or top-down versus bottom-up approaches. Sustainability recognizes that

agricultural production must protect nature’s resources, and “that societies [must] meet

human needs both by increasing productive potential and by ensuring equitable

opportunities for all,” (Brundtland, 1987, chapter 2, paragraph 1)

Until recently, the planet was a large world in which human activities and their
effects were neatly compartmentalized within nations, within sectors (energy,
agriculture, trade), and within broad areas of concern (environment, economics,
social). These compartments have begun to dissolve. (Brundtland, 1987, chapter
1, paragraph 11)

Climate change is the result of human activities and how their impacts permeate national

borders. We cannot compartmentalize the impacts of human activities in one area of the

world without acknowledging the impacts on another. As I will demonstrate later in this

section, the Global North uses far more energy per capita than the Global South, which

means that the Global North emits more greenhouse gases that are contributing to global

warming. As global temperatures increase, sea levels will rise due to the increasing rate

of glacier retreat, shrinking ice sheets and ocean thermal expansion. While developing

archipelagic countries like the Philippines will be the most vulnerable to the negative

impacts of climate change, they do not have the economic resources to invest in

adaptation and mitigation technologies.

The concept of sustainability brings into focus an obligation to transform the

global food system, by making it more environmentally, socially and economically viable

(Altieri, 2005). Proponents of food sovereignty believe “the right of peoples to healthy

and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable

methods,” (Agarwal, 2014, p. 1248). They argue that food and farming are much more

than just increases in food production and international trade.

 Wiedemann 41

La Via Campesina argues that every country and people must have the right and
the ability to define their own food, farming, and agricultural policies, that they
need to have the right to protect domestic markets and to have public sector
budgets for agriculture that may include subsidies which do not lead to excessive
production, exports, dumping, and damage to other countries. (Martinez-Torres,
Rosset, 2010, 160)

Also, as the MDG’s reached its target date of December 31st, 2015, the United

Nations (UN) has embarked on a new international plan called the Sustainable

Development Goals (SDGs). According to the UN, one of the outcomes of the Rio+20

Conference was “to launch a process to develop a set of SDGs, which will build upon the

MDGs and converge with the post 2015 development agenda,”

(www.sustainabledevelopment.un.org). As of January 2015, the UN has announced the

following 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which will be adopted in September 2015.

Figure 4: Sustainable Development Goals

Sustainable Development Goals

Goal 1 End poverty in all its forms everywhere
Goal 2 End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture
Goal 3 Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
Goal 4 Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
Goal 5 Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
Goal 6 Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all
Goal 7 Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent
Goal 8
work for all
Goal 9 Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation
Goal 10 Reduce inequality within and among countries
Goal 11 Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable
Goal 12 Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns
Goal 13 Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts*
Goal 14 Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development
Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat
Goal 15
desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss

Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build
Goal 16
effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels
Goal 17 Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development
 Wiedemann 42

According to Edelman et al authors of “Introduction: Critical Perspectives On

Food Sovereignty” published in the The Journal of Peasant Studies, “agroecology has

become much more systematically integrated into the food sovereignty discourse and

practice,” (2014, 921). Miguel Altieri, Professor of Agroecology at the University of

Berkeley, explains that “agroecology is an applied science, adapting ecological concepts

and principles to the design and management of sustainable agroecosystems,” (Altieri,

1987, 2), and “with a minimal dependence on high agrochemical and energy inputs,

emphasizing complex agricultural systems in which ecological interactions and

synergisms between biological components provide mechanisms for the systems to

sponsor their own soil fertility, productivity and crop protection,” (Altieri, Nicholls,

2008, 473).

One of the main principles of agroecology is to consider the interrelationship of

all the components of an ecosystem. An agroecosystem considers a community of plants

and animals functioning together within a physical and chemical environment that has

been altered for agricultural production. “The ultimate goal of agroecological design is to

integrate components so that overall biological efficiency is improved, biodiversity is

preserved, and the productivity of agroecosystems and their self-sustaining capacities are

maintained,” (Altieri, 1987, 3). In agroecology, the new method combines modern

agricultural science with indigenous/native knowledge.

In Peru, researchers have uncovered remnants of thousands of hectacres of ‘ridged

fields’ in search of solutions to contemporary problems of high-altitude farming.
A fascinating example is the revival of an ingenious system of raised fields that
evolved on the high plains of the Peruvian Andes about 3,000 years ago.
According to archaeological evidence, these Waru-Warus platforms of soil
surrounded by ditches filled with water were able to produce bumper crops,
despite floods, droughts and the killing frost common at altitudes of nearly 4,000
m (Denevan, 1992).
 Wiedemann 43

The combination of raised beds and canals has proven to have important
temperature moderation effects, extending the growing season and leading to high
productivity on the Waru-Warus compared to chemically fertilized normal pampa
soils. (Altieri, 2008, 476)

Agroecology is being spearheaded by thousands of farmers, NGOs and some government

and academic institutions globally. According to Altieri, this method can enhance food

security while conserving natural resources, agrobiodiversity, and soil and water

conservation, especially throughout low-income communities that cannot afford GMs.

(Altieri, 1987)

The sustainability model is essential for the development of an environmentally

sensitive global food system. Its role should be to meet the food needs of everyone today

without compromising the food needs of future generations. Agroecology recognizes the

importance of combining agricultural production and technology in order to ensure

sustainability. When we consider the fact that this planet is currently the only place on

which humans can survive, and economic development can trigger widespread negative

impacts like climate change, it is imperative to proposition a food system with

sustainability at its core. In the following section I discuss the negative impacts of climate

change on agriculture, particularly in the Philippines.

3.2.2 Climate Change

Food security for the estimated 9 billion people by 2050 will need an
extraordinary effort, even without climate change. With climate change, even
with the best efforts at mitigations, poor farmers and especially women and
children are likely to be affected adversely. (Agarwal, 2014, 1251)
 Wiedemann 44

According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)27, “the

atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, sea

level has risen, and the concentrations of greenhouse gases have increased,” (IPCC, 2013,

p. 4). Record-breaking measurements for melting glaciers, typhoons in the Philippines

and drought in California are some of the adverse impacts of climate change. In this

section, I demonstrate how climate change will exacerbate environmental degradation

and global food production. First, I will discuss the climate change indicators. Second, I

will list the causes of climate change. Third, I will list the impacts of climate change.

Climate Change Indicators

According to the IPCC, “climate change refers to a change in the state of the

climate that can be identified by changes in the mean and/or the variability of its

properties, and that persists for an extended period, typically decades or longer,” (2014,

p. 4). There are three main indicators of climate change: global warming, sea-level rise,

and extreme weather events. Data is collected with either direct measurements or remote

sensing, with instruments such as thermometers or satellites.

In the Northern Hemisphere, 1983 - 2012 was considered the warmest period of

the last 1400 years (IPCC, 2013, 3). Overall, there was a 0.85°C increase in global

temperature from 1880 to 2012 (Wheeler et al, 2013, p. 509). Six decades worth of data

were collected from surface temperatures over land, over sea, and in ocean surface water

to produce global climate change models. Figure five shows the temperature variation

27
“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the leading international body for the assessment of
climate change. It was established by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World
Meteorological Organization (WMO) in 1988 to provide the world with a clear scientific view on the current state of
knowledge in climate change and its potential environmental and socio-economic impacts.”
<http://www.ipcc.ch/organization/organization.shtml>
 Wiedemann 45

from 1950 to 2013. The color intensity displays a range from -0.5°C (blue) to +0.5°C

(orange). The dominant presence of orange is an indicator that there is a global rise in

temperature. The Philippines has experienced an increase in annual mean temperature of

0.57°C from 1951 to 2009.

Figure 5: Temperature Trends

Temperature trends from 1950-2013. Image credit: NASA’s GISS

The second indicator of climate change is sea-level rise (IPCC, 2013, 4). Sea-

level rise is due to melting glaciers, melting polar ice caps and the rising temperature of

the ocean. From 1901 to 2010, the average rate of global sea level rise was 1.7 mm per

year, but 3.2 mm per year from 1993 – 2010 (IPCC, 2013, 11). From 1880 to 2010, the

average rate of sea level rise in the Philippines was 1.4 mm per year (PAGASA, 2011,

15).

The third indicator is the increase in frequency of extreme weather events. By

extreme they mean record-breaking measurements. According to the FAO, “an average
 Wiedemann 46

of 500 weather-related disasters are now taking place each year, compared to 120 in the

1980s, and the number of floods has increased six-fold over the same period,” (2008, 8).

As the Philippines is located along the Ring of Fire and along a typhoon belt it is prone to

volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, typhoons and floods. Among these natural disasters,

typhoons and floods are adverse impacts of climate change. According to the World

Meteorological Organization, the Philippine Area of Responsibility (PAR) witnessed 20

tropical cyclones in 2008 (2009, 4). The latest extreme event was in 2013, when the

Philippines experienced one of the strongest typhoons ever recorded - Typhoon Haiyan.

Causes of Climate Change

According to Cristina Milesi, a NASA Research Scientist with a doctorate in

ecosystem modeling and remote sensing, human activity has transformed nearly half of

the Earth’s surface. Humans appropriate up to 50 percent of our Earth’s global net

primary production (NPP). NPP is the energy base of all vegetation productivity in our

ecosystems, from providing us oxygen to breath and food to consume.

Global atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide

have increased markedly as a result of human activities since 1750 and now far
exceed pre-industrial values determined from ice cores spanning many thousands
of years. The global increases in carbon dioxide concentration are due primarily
to fossil fuel use and land use change, while those of methane and nitrous oxide
are primarily due to agriculture. (IPCC, 2007, 2)

GHG emissions in the atmosphere create a “greenhouse effect” that traps heat into the

atmosphere. Without the greenhouse effect the Earth would be highly vulnerable to the

sun and experience extreme temperature differences. For example, our moon has a very

thin atmosphere, almost non-existent. On the light side of the moon, temperatures can be

as high as 230° F, and on the dark side as low as –290°F. Thus the greenhouse effect is
 Wiedemann 47

imperative for our survival.

The GHGs most linked with global warming are CO2, methane (CH4) and nitrous

oxide (N2O). All of these gases are natural by-products of homeostasis and Earth’s

ecosystem. However, ever since mankind augmented GHG emissions into the atmosphere

we have been drastically changing the Earth’s composition, which has negatively

impacted climates and ecosystems. People have augmented GHG emissions by pumping

fossil fuel out of the ground, boosting deforestation and the over-use of fertilizers. 28

The rise in GHG emissions into the atmosphere has increased since the Industrial

Revolution of the early 19th century. Giddens describes this era as “the decline of

feudalism, agrarian production based in the local manor is replaced by production for

markets of national and international scope . . . harnessing production to human needs

through the industrial exploitation of nature,” (1991, 9-10).

According to the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers

(CGIAR), “agriculture and food production contribute up to 29 percent of global

greenhouse gas emissions,” (2012),29 releasing up to 17,000 megatons of CO2 annually.

This figure includes every element of the food system from farm to table: manufacturing

fertilizer; transportation; refrigeration; and waste. Globally, livestock releases 18 percent

of global greenhouse gas emissions, which is more than the transportation sector (FAO,

2006, xxi). Also, livestock is responsible for the largest case of deforestation, especially

in Latin America. “Over the past quarter century, forests have been cleared from an area

the size of India . . . Deforestation causes incalculable environmental damage, releasing

28
Nobel Prize winner Fritz Haber discovered how to synthesize nitrogen. The Haber-Bosch process is responsible for
the early stages of fertilizers, but also the early stages of nitrous pollution in water streams, etc.
29
CGIAR. (2012). Agriculture and Food Production Contribute Up to 29 Percent of Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions:
According to Comprehensive Research Papers. Accessed on November 7, 2014. <http://ccafs.cgiar.org/news/press-
releases/agriculture-and-food-production-contribute-29-percent-global-greenhouse-gas#.VGGVIEuI3Ro>
 Wiedemann 48

billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and driving thousands of species

of life to extinction each year,” (FAO, 2011, p. 1).

According to World Bank’s Energy Use data table, the Philippines used up to 426

kg of oil equivalent per capita in 2011.30 As a comparison, the United States used 7,032

kg. The number one user of energy on this data table is Qatar, which used 17,419 kg. The

Philippines has a low number by default. As a developing country, 55 percent of its

population lives in rural areas, and almost 80 percent of the country’s poor live there

(IFAD, 2009, 1).

Impacts of Climate Change

Impacts of such climate-related extremes include alteration of ecosystems,

disruption of food production and water supply, damage to infrastructure and
settlements, morbidity and mortality, and consequences for mental health and
human wellbeing. For countries at all levels of development, these impacts are
consistent with a significant lack of preparedness for current climate variability in
some sectors. (IPCC, 2014, p. 10)31

The IPCC reports that the 0.85°C increase in global surface temperature is causing global

shifts in rainfall patterns that affect agricultural productivity. According to PAGASA32,

there are some major changes in rainfall in different parts of the Philippines, but extreme

changes in daily rainfall are not statistically significant (2011, 21).

The greatest climate change impact on agriculture in the Philippines is natural

disaster. The Philippine Area of Responsibility (PAR)33, the geographical area that

PAGASA is responsible for monitoring and reporting weather, states that there are no

30
World Bank. Energy use (kg of oil equivalent per capita). Accessed on November 7, 2014.
<http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.USE.PCAP.KG.OE>
31
IPCC. “Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptations, and Vulnerability: Summary for Policymakers.
32
PAGASA: Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical & Astronomical Services Administration.
33
PAR is an imaginary geographical area that extends beyond the Philippines borderline, in which PAGASA monitors
weather activity.
 Wiedemann 49

changes in the frequency of cyclones, which averages at 20 cyclones per year. “However,

there is a very slight increase in the number of tropical cyclones with maximum sustained

winds of greater than 150kph [93mph] and above (typhoon category) being exhibited

during [the] El Niño event,” (PAGASA, 2011, 17). In 2013, Typhon Haiyan ripped

across central Philippines claiming 6,300 lives, but in the aftermath many farmers were

sent back to ground zero. For example, the FAO reports 33 million coconut trees were

lost during Typhoon Haiyan, which has affected the livelihoods of more than one million

coconut farmers.34 The Philippines was the largest producer of coconuts, growing almost

20 million tons or 36 percent of the world’s production in 2010. It can take up to six to

eight years for coconut trees to bring coconut farmers income again.

In this section, I have highlighted Sagan and Brundtland’s point of view that the

vision of Earth from space is a reminder that this is the only planet known so far to harbor

life. International guidelines such as Our Common Future and methods such as

agroecology have been introduced globally to minimize the negative impacts of

industrialized agriculture. With that said, this section is important to my argument

because it demonstrates how we need to look at the current neoliberal Western style of

our global food system, which is unsustainable. As stated earlier, the current system

“assumes that the Earth has an endless supply of natural resources at one end, and a

limitless capacity to absorb waste and pollution at the other,” (IIED, 2012, 1). Unless we

take more drastic measures we cannot reverse the damage that has already perpetuated

global warming, climate change and environmental degradation that will further

34
FAO. (2014).Philippine coconut farmers struggling to recover from typhoon. Accessed on November 7, 2014.
<http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/212957/icode/>
 Wiedemann 50

exacerbate the current state of the global food system.

In the following section, I provide the history and background of the Philippines

to highlight the state of the Philippines and how foreign influence has contributed to its

food inequities and environmental degradation.

 Wiedemann 51

Chapter IV: The Republic of the Philippines

4.1 The History and Background of the Philippines

The Philippines was rice self-sufficient in the late 1970s to the first half of the

1980s. By “The Great Hunger Crisis of 2008” the Philippines was highly dependent on

rice imports at a time when rice prices almost tripled. Philippine Congressman Walden

Bello eloquently traces the evolution of this crisis back to neoliberal economic

restructuring in his book The Food Wars.

From a net food exporter, the country had become a net food importer beginning
in the mid-1990s, and the essential reason . . . that is, the subjugation of the
country to a structural adjustment program that was one of the first in the
developing world. (Bello, 2009, 67)

Growing up in California, I was taught that Ferdinand Magellan “discovered” the

Philippines in 1521. In fact, if one searches the Internet for “who discovered the

Philippines,” Google posts a window from Wikipedia stating the same thing. However,

people have lived on the Philippine islands since 3000 B.C.E. when Austronesians

migrated there (Nadeau, 2008, xviii), like the Native Americans who have been living in

the U.S. before Christopher Columbus discovered it. Before Spanish colonization, the

Philippines had played a role in trade for the Sri-Vijaya Empire, followed by the Ming

Dynasty. When the Spanish arrived in 1521 the Philippines was already part of an

intricate and much more “modern” trading system.

Asians traded in silk and cotton textiles when medieval Europeans were still
exchanging animal skins for coarsely spun materials. Asians had already achieved
far greater advances in seamanship, science, medicine, civil administration, and
foreign diplomacy than had medieval Western Europeans. Asian societies and
cultures were prospering, and their people enjoyed a much higher standard of
living than did Europeans. (Nadeau, 2008, 19)
 Wiedemann 52

In fact, what led to the discovery of the Philippines was a result of Spain wanting a piece

of the trade industry. Especially, at a time when their was an increase in demand for

Asian spices and goods among Europeans, and most importantly when merchants who

controlled the ports in Egypt and Turkey added as much taxes to Asian imports as

Europeans would tolerate. (Nadeau, 2008)

According to Kathleen Nadeau, an associate professor of anthropology at

California State University, San Bernadino, during colonization the Spaniards had three

objectives. The first was to gain a share of the spice trade in south and Southeast Asia.

The second was to establish a trade center between China and Mexico, another Spanish

colony. The third was to spread Catholicism. The Spanish influence did two things to the

Philippine people. First, the inhabitants of the islands, who had hundreds of languages

and cultures, were becoming united as a country as more people adopted Catholicism.

However, friars who were responsible for spreading Catholicism favored the royalty and

nobility among the natives. Over time this made way for a feudal system, where there

was a small class of Spanish, Filipino and Chinese elites who were becoming wealthy

and western educated, while commoners and slaves became peasants who were being

exploited for their labor in producing cash crops, such as sugar, tobacco and rubber to be

traded.

At the turn of the 20th century, a combination of events led to the decolonization

of Spain. First, Europe was experiencing economic and political change from the

Industrial Revolution. Europe had transformed into an industrialized economy seeking

raw materials and new markets to offload surplus. The Spanish saw this as an opportunity

to restructure the economy by stimulating industrialized agriculture in order to integrate

 Wiedemann 53

the Philippines into the European market system (Nadeau, 2008). This restructuring of

agricultural production infuriated both peasants and the Filipino and Chinese elites,

because it was done without any permission combined “with increasing land grabbing by

friars and colonial elites,” (Nadeau, 2008, 34). Second, the idea of Filipino nationalism

was burgeoning, because no matter how well educated or westernized Filipinos became

they always “remained outside of the upper echelons of the ruling circles in colonial

society,” (Nadeau, 2008, 39). And at last, the Spanish-American War of 1898 meant the

Filipinos had an ally in their fight for independence.

After the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1898, the United States had gained

control of Spanish colonies including Puerto Rico and the Philippine Islands. Instead of

gaining its independence the Philippines became a Commonwealth of the U.S. However,

the American “colonization” of the Philippines would only last until July 4, 1945. Among

one of the focal points in this period was the Japanese occupation of the Philippines

during World War II, which was a consequence of America sending most of its resources

and supplies to fight in Europe. During the Japanese occupation, somewhere between

40,000 to 70,000 American and Filipino men had become prisoners of war (POW).

Among them was my grandfather, Private Gaudencio Ventura, who served in the Army’s

Medical Department.35 Unfortunately, I do not know much about what happened to my

grandfather while a POW, because he passed away when I was a baby. My talkative

grandmother is tight-lipped when it comes to discussing WWII. She is only willing to

assert one thing that she volunteered to be a nurse during WWII where she met my

35
Gaudencio Ventura is listed in the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Registration Records or the World
War II Prisoners of the Japanese Data Files, ca 1941 – ca. 1945.
 Wiedemann 54

Grandfather. As an outcome of his service, my Grandfather and his family were

naturalized and moved to northern California.

After the Philippines gained its independence from the United States, the first five

postwar Presidents would encounter a roller coaster ride as they adjusted to being a

republican state. To follow them would become the most notorious president of the

Republic of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos. At the time, the United States viewed the

Philippines as the only thriving democratic Asian state. President Lyndon B. Johnson

highly appreciated President Marcos for exerting democratic principles. “His economic,

political, and militaristic restructuring program melded well with U.S. foreign policy at

the time, which favored export-driven and top-down development and strengthening the

military to fight against the so-called Communist threat,” (Nadeau, 2008, 81). With the

rise of Cold War, the U.S. had positioned two military bases in the Philippines to fend off

communist Asian countries like Vietnam and Korea. The Subic Naval Base and Clark Air

Base were the largest U.S. bases in the world.

Marcos ruled the Philippines for 21 years, from 1965 – 1986. In his reign the

Philippine economy spiraled down due to poor leadership and reliance on foreign funds

coupled with government corruption and the institution of martial law, but in his era he

was able to achieve national rice self-sufficiency.

The dictator Ferdinand Marcos was guilty of many crimes and misdeeds,
including failure to follow through on land reform, but one thing he could not be
accused of was starving the agricultural sector of government support. (Bello,
2009, 55)

Marcos had increased irrigation from 500,000 ha in the 1960s to 1.3 million ha in the

1980s (Bello, 2009, 55). He also instituted the Masagana 99 (M99) program “consisting

of low-interest, no-collateral credit loans tied to the use of high-yielding rice seed
 Wiedemann 55

varieties, fertilizers, and herbicides, raised rural production and productivity,” (Bello,

2009, 55). M99 was successful in making the Philippines rice self-sufficient, and the

substantial government investment contributed to agricultural growth by five percent a

year (Bello, 2009). It is said that when Marcos was exiled to the U.S. in 1986 there were

900,000 MT of rice in government warehouses (Bello, 2009).

Peasant farmers of the Philippines would paint a different picture. Even amidst

the agricultural prosperity peasants became more marginalized and bore the brunt of the

“success.”

The relatively high outlays [M99] demanded led to large-scale credit defaults
among smallholders, and as a World Bank report noted, “a disproportionate
amount” of the new technology “has probably gone to landlords, farmers with
irrigation, relatively large or progressive farmers, owners of inputs, and creditors.
(Bello, 2009, 56)

During the Green Revolution, when the Rockefeller and Ford foundations established the

IRRI in 1960, the cost of the HYV technology could only be sustained by large-scale

industrial farmers. Small-scale farmers did not anticipate additional necessary

expenditures, such as that for pesticides and fertilizers that were vital to the success of

HYVs. As a consequence, HYVs of rice deteriorated, and small-scale farmers began to

mortgage, and eventually lose, their land (Nadeau, 2008). Also, the over use of pesticides

and fertilizers depleted the soil of essential nutrients for agricultural production. The

Green Revolution ended up benefiting large-scale, industrialized farmers as they could

afford to maintain HYVs while their yields doubled.

The later introduction of structural adjustment programs in the 1980s also

contributed to the decline of the Philippine economy. The World Bank tested the program

in Bolivia, Turkey, Kenya and the Philippines (Bello, 2009).

 Wiedemann 56

The aims of structural adjustment included making an economy more ‘efficient’

by exposing it to the winds of international competition, enabling a country to
gain the dollars to pay off its foreign debt by pushing it into export-oriented
production, and opening up an economy more fully to foreign trade and foreign
investment. (Bello, 2009, 56)

The Philippine government acquired a structural adjustment loan by demonstrating

interest in industrialization through “accelerating industrial growth, expand employment

more rapidly, maintain the rapid growth of nontraditional exports, increase the efficiency

of capital use, and stimulate industry outside of the Metropolitan Manila area,” (World

Bank, 1980, i). This would be achieved by “export promotion, tariff reform and trade

liberalization, investment incentives, industrial restructuring, and major industrial

projects,” (World Bank, 1980, i). According to Bello, import tariffs that once protected

local manufacturers in the Philippines went from 44 percent to 20 percent, which ended

up bankrupting many industries, such as textiles, rubber products, petrochemicals,

beverages, wood, and clothing (2009). In one example, Bello stated that the textile

industry went from two hundred companies to ten. “While consumers may have benefited

from tariff cuts, he said, liberalization ‘has killed so many local industries,” (Bello, 2009,

57). In addition, the debt in the Philippines increased to $29 billion in 1989 from $13

billion at the end of 1979 (Solon, Floro, 1993, 4).

According to Bello, “among the items cut most sharply was spending on

agriculture, which fell by more than half, from 7.5 percent of total government spending

in 1982 under Marcos to 3.3 percent in 1988 under Aquino,” (Bello, 2009, 59). The

countryside was hit the hardest during the structural adjustment programs. Out of 4.7

million ha only 1.3 million ha was irrigated (Bello, 2008). This caused an increase in
 Wiedemann 57

migration to the urban Metropolitan Manila area. Mike Davis author of Planet of Slums

argues,

Structural adjustment, it would appear, has recently worked an equally

fundamental reshaping of human futures. As the authors of The Challenge of
Slums conclude: ‘Instead of being a focus for growth and prosperity, the cities
have become a dumping ground for a surplus population working in unskilled,
unprotected and low-wage informal service industries and trade,” (Davis, 2006,
174-175)

When the Philippine government became a member of the WTO in 1995 it was

forbidden to set quotas on agricultural imports, plus they were required to set low tariff

rates on a certain percentage of each commodity (Bello, 2009, 60). Dominance of the

WTO affected the agricultural sector, particularly with the production of rice. First, the

price of rice and other agricultural products was cheaper in the international trade market

causing Filipinos to purchase more rice imports rather than procuring rice from domestic

farmers. Ultimately, this led to the decline in rice self-sufficiency and the country fell

behind the production rate of its top two suppliers, Thailand and Vietnam. Imports of rice

rose dramatically from 263,000 MT in 1995 to 2.1 million MT in 1998 (Bello, 2009).

Today, the Philippines is considered a developing country, with a lower middle

income status. According to the World Bank, GDP in 2013 was $272 Billion USD and

the 39th largest economy in the world, with a 7.2 percent annual growth rate. The

population of the Philippines is 98.39 million people. A little more than 25 percent live in

poverty and almost 80 percent of the country’s poor live in rural areas (IFAD, 2009, 1).

The poverty threshold in the Philippines is “the minimum income required to meet the

food requirements and other non-food basic needs,” (WFP, 2012, 10). According to the

National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB), “in 2012, a family of five will need

around PhP5,513 [$133.65 USD] monthly to buy their minimum basic food needs; and
 Wiedemann 58

around PhP7,890 [$191.28 USD] monthly for their minimum basic food and non-food

needs,” (NSCB, 2012, vii).

President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III became the 15th President of the

Philippines in June 2010. He is also the son of presidential candidate Benigno Aquino Jr.

who was allegedly assassinated by dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1983. His mother,

President Corazon Aquino, succeeded and ended the Marcos dynasty. According to

World Bank’s Doing Business report, the Philippines is considered one of the most

improving economies in the 2012/2013 fiscal year. Since “the Rice Crisis of 2008”,

Aquino III has become interested in achieving rice self-sufficiency. In his second State of

the Nation Address, he stated,36 “what we want to happen [in this nation]: First, we do

not have to import what we do not need. Second, we do not have to rely on imports. What

Juan De La Cruz (“John Doe”) cooks will be planted here, harvested here, bought here.”

President Aquino III was stating to the Philippine congress that Philippines will become a

rice self-sufficient nation. His administration implemented the FSSP that would run from

2011 to 2016.

According to the NSCB, there are 81 provinces, 144 cities, 1,490 municipalities,

and 42,028 baranguays37. The country is divided into 17 regions. I list these regions

because I examine the distribution of poverty and hunger in the Philippines by region in

Chapter five. This is important because poverty and hunger are unequally distributed

throughout the Philippines. As I will discuss further in Chapter five, rapid urbanization in

Metro-Manila and war in the Southern region of the Philippines are driving factors to

poverty and hunger in the country.

36
This is a translation from “Ang gusto nating mangyari: Una, hindi na tayo aangkat ng hindi kailangan. Ikalawa,
ayaw na nating umasa sa pag-angkat. Ang isasaing ni Juan Dela Cruz dito ipupunla, dito aanihin, dito bibilhin.”
37
A baranguay is a barrio.
 Wiedemann 59

Figure 6: Seventeen Regions of the Philippines

4.2 Agriculture

The Philippines is made up of 7,107 islands, giving it 22,549 miles (36,289 km)

of coastline. This is longer than the United States with 12,380 miles (19,924 km). The

Philippines has an area of 115,831 square miles (300,000 km2), where 40.6 percent was

dedicated to agricultural land in 2011 (World Bank, 2013).38 Only 9.4 percent of the total

agricultural land is irrigated. According to the World Bank, in 2012 their gross domestic

product (GDP) was $252 million USD, of which 11.8 percent came from agriculture.

About 40 million or 41 percent of the population worked in the agricultural sector, and

the average daily nominal wage rates for palay39 farmers was P241.98 (BAS, 2012).

The evolution of agricultural reform policies can be broken down into three

categories (Galero, So, Tiongco, 2014). First was the Green Revolution, which

38
Bureau of Agricultural Statistics, Philippines. Accessed on September 2013. <http://countrystat.bas.gov.ph/?cont=3>
39
Palay is another word for unhusked rice.
 Wiedemann 60

contributed to rice self-sufficiency in the 70s and 80s due to the introduction of HYVs,

and the government’s interest in increasing agricultural productivity. According to

Nadeau, “Marcos depended on the . . . technology to promote his development of export

agriculture as a major source of income and foreign exchange,” (2008, 88). As a dictator,

Marcos pushed for government control of agricultural production.

Second was the liberalization era, which is attributed to the government’s

participation in the WTO in 1995. The deregulation led to the “growth” of the private

sector. Without tariffs and government control of the market, insufficient peasant farmers

who were new to privatization were vulnerable to the international trade market. Their

inability to keep up with demands or lack of knowledge of a market-oriented trading

system led many industrial sectors to fail, including the agriculture industry.

The current economy can be labeled as the Post-2008 era, as it marks the “Rice

Crisis of 2008” as the beginning of a new era, a time when the government implemented

FSSP, also known as the Rice Self-Sufficiency program. According to the Philippine

Department of Agriculture, the program hopes to increase local procurement while

reducing imports, boost agricultural infrastructure by increasing the rate of irrigation and

roads, enhance research and development for mitigation and adaptation technologies for

expected and non-expected natural disasters, broaden crop diversity and develop

consumer education (2012).

Figure seven is a summary of the evolution of the agricultural economy and

agrarian reform policies40, presented at the De La Salle University Research Congress in

40
Galero, S., So, S., & Tiongco, M. (2014). Food Security Versus Rice Self-Sufficiency: Policy Lessons From The
Philippines. Presented at the DLSU Research Congress 2014.
<http://www.dlsu.edu.ph/conferences/dlsu_research_congress/2014/_pdf/proceedings/FNH-II-011-ft.pdf>
 Wiedemann 61

2014. This convention is held annually for researchers, educators and students to

collaborate on economic issues in the Philippines.

Figure 7: Evolution of the Agrarian Reform Policies

Evolution of The Agrarian Reform Policies. Source: DLSU Research Congress 2014.

Fish and rice are staple foods of the Philippines. However, “eight commodities

account for 80 percent of the gross value added (GVA) of agriculture. These are palay,

fishing, livestock, poultry, corn, banana, coconut, and sugarcane,” (DAO, 2012, 5).

Figure eight displays each of the commodities’ GVA by dollar amount, and by percent of

share of the total GVA.

 Wiedemann 62

Since the implementation of the FSSP, the Philippines had the highest production

of rice and corn in its agricultural history. According to the Philippine Department of

Agriculture (DOA), there was an eight percent increase for palay or 18.03 million MT,

and there was a six percent increase for corn or 7.41 million MT. “The significant

Figure 8: Top Eight Commodities in Philippine Agricultural Output

Eight commodities that make up 80 percent of total agricultural output, 2012.

Source: Department of Agriculture, 2012.

reduction in rice imports from 2.4 million MT in 2010 . . . to 500,000 MT in 2012 is a

direct consequence of the policy decision to prioritize palay procurement from local

producers,” (DOA, 2012, 2).

Fish is also a major staple of the Philippines. The sustainable fishing initiatives of

the Philippine government initially had resistance among local fisheries. The initiative

asked people in the Zamboanga Peninsula to implement a closed season from December

2011 to February 2012 (DOA, 2012). By implementing an outreach or local campaign,

 Wiedemann 63

the locals were willing to collaborate, which ended in success for the fishing communities

as fishing yields increased. Due to the success, it was duplicated in other regions of the

Philippines.

Agricultural Trade (Statistics from the Philippine DOA)

The agricultural trade balance in 2012, which is the total value of exports minus

imports, was negative $3,118.88 million USD. This is an improvement from 2008 when

the country was highly dependent on the importation of staple foods. The agricultural

trade balance in 2008 was negative $3,795.44 million USD. Due to the country’s

implementation of the FSSP it is trying to outpace the growing demand of staple foods.

According to the Selected Statistics on Agriculture, the Philippines “recorded agricultural

trade surplus with Japan and the European Union, [but] it had trade deficits with

Australia, USA, ASEAN countries and the rest of the world,” (2012, 2).

The value of agricultural exports decreased to $5,003.50 million USD in 2012

from 5,431.76 million USD in 2011, mainly due to the decrease in value of the top

agricultural exports, such as coconuts, bananas, tuna, pineapple, seaweed, sugar, milk,

and fertilizer. For example, there was a $1 billion USD loss in coconut oil exports in

2012, which is a 28.7 percent decline from 2011. The decrease in value of this

commodity was due to the weak demand for this product in the United States and

European Union. Despite the decrease in value of overall exports, some commodities still

had strong economic growth, such as tuna, bananas and pineapple. Tuna’s share

increased to 9.1 percent in 2012 from 5.8 percent in 2011 putting it in third place of total

agricultural exports.
 Wiedemann 64

The value of agricultural imports increased to $8,122.38 million USD in 2012

from $7,839.93 million USD in 2011. The country’s top agricultural imports are wheat,

milk, soybean products, manufactured fertilizer, coffee, meat of bovine animals, urea,

tobacco, corn, and rice. The leading supplier of wheat was the United States of America.

New Zealand was the leading supplier of milk and cream.

This section is important to my argument because it demonstrates how throughout

Philippines’ history, foreign influence particularly Western influence has contributed to

its food inequities and environmental degradation. Thus leading to the current President

to enact the FSSP in order to alleviate the Philippines’ vulnerability to policy shifts and

price fluctuations in the international trade market, in order to achieve food sovereignty.

As stated in the agriculture section, the FSSP has demonstrated improvements in

agricultural production particularly with rice in recent years. Even the current state of the

country’s GDP, agricultural GDP and agricultural trade are improving. However, the

country’s population is increasing at a high rate, and the archipelagic disaster-prone

country is geographically too small to keep up with demands. Eventually, there will be a

struggle to maintain real estate between living space versus food production, which

furthers the threat of sustainability calling to question any efforts to maintain agricultural

sustainability and food sovereignty.

In the following section, I further investigate the current state of the Philippines’s

effort to achieve food sovereignty and the adverse impacts it will have on agricultural and

economic prosperity.
 Wiedemann 65

Chapter V: Data/Findings

Figure 9: Typhoon Haiyan Over the Philippines

The MODIS instrument aboard NASA’s Aqua satellite captured Typhoon

Haiyan as it moved over the central Philippines on Nov. 8 at 05:10 UTC/. Image
credit: NASA Goddard MODIS Rapid Response Team.

Identifying the Challenges of Maintaining Food Sovereignty in the Philippines

In this section I present my data and findings. First, I reiterate the statement of the

thesis. Next, I examine the Philippine food system, by referencing the five challenges I

list in the statement of the thesis. The purpose of this section is to help identify the unique

challenges for the country.

 Wiedemann 66

5.1 Statement of the Thesis

Agricultural production is inherently dependent on local climates, ecosystems and

environments. However, our current food system is based on a neoliberal western style of

economic growth that is counterintuitive to sustainability. The purpose of this study

considers the case of the Philippines and examines the implications that maintaining

national rice self-sufficiency has on sustainability, and ultimately on the fate of the

country’s food sovereignty within the context of a neoliberal food system. Hence, this

thesis evaluates the extent to which maintaining national food self-sufficiency is no

longer sustainable, and to identify other challenges for the Philippines to maintain food

sovereignty. I argue that maintaining national food sovereignty is not sustainable for

every country. This study examines “why” in the case of the Philippines.

As stated earlier, the widely used definition of food sovereignty among advocates

is the definition developed at the Nyéléni Forum for Food Sovereignty in Mali, in 2007.

Food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food
produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to
define their own food and agriculture systems. It puts the aspirations and needs of
those who produce, distribute and consume food at the heart of food systems and
policies, rather than the demands of markets and corporations. It offers a strategy
to resist and dismantle the current corporate and food regime . . . It defends the
interests and inclusion of the next generation . . . Food sovereignty prioritises
local and national economies and markets, and empowers peasant and family
farmer-driven agriculture . . . It ensures . . . the rights to use and manage lands . . .
[It] implies new social relations free of oppression and inequality between men
and women, peoples, racial groups, social and economic classes and generations.
(Agarwal, 2014, p. 1248)

In order to answer the question, “why maintaining national food sovereignty is not

suitable for the Philippines,” I have divided the definition of food sovereignty into five

separate criteria. Then I will address challenges in achieving each of these criteria in the

Philippines as defined by advocates of food sovereignty.

 Wiedemann 67

1) The right of people to access healthy and culturally appropriate food.

2) Food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods.
Sustainability means that agricultural methods consider the interests and
inclusion of the next generation.
3) Right to define their food and agriculture systems, where “their” prioritizes
local and national economies and markets rather than the demands of markets
and corporations.
4) The aspirations and needs of those who produce, distribute and consume food
are at the heart of food systems and policies, and empowers peasant and
family farmer-driven agriculture, and it ensures their rights to use and manage
lands.
5) New social relations free of oppression and inequality between men and
women, peoples, racial groups, social and economic classes and generations.

Advocates of food sovereignty created this definition to counteract the inequities

faced by peasant farmers brought on by supranational trade organizations and

multinational food corporations. However, in the following five sections I discuss the

challenges the Philippines face in maintaining each of the criteria. To sum up my

findings, first I find that the Philippines have met its MDG target one goal, which is to

halve the number of people suffering from undernourishment. Next, the government

plays an active role in permitting farmers to use sustainable methods, but its main goal is

to achieve food self-sufficiency at the national level. By implementing the FSSP the

Philippines is able to increase production for culturally appropriate foods, such as rice

and fish. However, as a small archipelagic country prone to natural disaster coupled with

population growth, it will be difficult to maintain national food self-sufficiency and a

sustainable food system. Eventually, the country will have to depend on food imports and

the international trade market.

 Wiedemann 68

5.2.1 Food Sovereignty Criterion 1: The right of people to access healthy and
culturally appropriate food.

There are two ways to identify the rate of hunger in the Philippines. The first is

through the FAO’s The State of Food Insecurity in the World report. This report gathers

worldwide statistics on undernourishment. The FAO defines undernourishment as, “a

state, lasting for at least one year, of inability to acquire enough food, defined as a level

of food intake insufficient to meet dietary energy requirements,” (FAO, 2014, 50).

According to this report, in 2013, the Philippines had 11.3 million people who were

undernourished, or 11.5 percent.41 This is a 26.3 percent improvement from 16.7 million

people who were undernourished in 1990. According to MDG target one, which is to

halve the number of people who are hungry by 2015 from 1990s statistics, the Philippines

achieved its goal.

The second is through IFPRI’s Global Hunger Index (GHI). The GHI combines

three indicators of hunger equally.

• Undernourishment: the proportion of undernourished people as a percentage

of the population (reflecting the share of the population with insufficient
caloric intake).
• Child underweight: the proportion of children younger than age five who are
underweight (low weight for their age reflecting wasting, stunted growth, or
both), which is one indicator of child undernutrition.
• Child mortality: the mortality rate of children younger than five (partially
reflecting that fatal synergy of inadequate food intake and unhealthy
environments). (IFPRI, 2013,7)

The Philippines had an overall score of 13.2 percent in 2013, which is a major

improvement from 19.9 percent in 1990. The outcome of the 2013 rate was an average of

41
FAO. (2014). The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2014. Accessed on November 2014.
<http://www.fao.org/3/a-i4030e.pdf>
 Wiedemann 69

17 percent who were undernourished, 20.2 percent of children who were underweight,

and there was a 2.5 percent child mortality rate. (IFPRI, 2013)

WFP is working with the Philippine Department of Social Welfare and

Development to aid government programs and projects that are trying to improve the

conditions of vulnerable populations. Since the Rice Crisis of 2008, the Philippines

implemented the FSSP. The goal is to be self-sufficient in rice, corn, cassava and fish.

According to the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics (BAS), in 2013 government

expenditure on agriculture was PhP111.14 billion ($2.5 billion USD) or 5.54 percent,

which was up by 26.03 percent from the previous year. Government loans on agriculture

totaled PhP729.27 billion ($16.44 billion USD), where 32 percent was attributed to

production loans. (BAS, 2013)

As a consequence, there was a significant reduction in rice imports from 2.4

million MT in 2010 to 398,000 MT in 2013. The Philippines produced 12 million MT in

2013, making them 97 percent rice self-sufficient. However, the domestic price of rice in

the farm, wholesale and retail market increased. In one example, the domestic wholesale

price of rice increased from 31.45 pesos per kilogram in 2010 to PhP34.49 ($.78 USD) in

2013. The wholesale price of rice is still at a much higher level than before the Rice

Crisis of 2008. The domestic wholesale price of rice was 18.21 pesos ($.40 USD) per

kilogram in 2002, at a time when the Philippines was 87.89 percent rice self-sufficient.

(BAS, 2013)

In comparison to rice, tilapia is neither heavily imported nor heavily exported.

The Philippines produced 317,756 MT in 2013, making them 99 percent tilapia self-

sufficient. However, the domestic wholesale price of tilapia also increased from 67.89
 Wiedemann 70

pesos ($.02 USD) per kilogram in 2010 to PhP74.07 ($74.07 USD) in 2013. The

domestic wholesale price of tilapia was 43.53 pesos ($.011 USD) per kilogram in 2002,

at a time when the country was only producing 122,400 MT. (BAS, 2003; BAS, 2011;

BAS, 2014)

Even though there is an increase in rice and tilapia production, and the decline in

imports are evidence of the country’s road to staple food self-sufficiency, food

accessibility remains insufficient.

Limited access to credit and financing and limited irrigation infrastructure

coupled with issues on climate change, natural and man-made disasters and
environmental degradation are the major challenges that farmers have to contend
with. Market mechanisms are also seen as disrupting food availability in the
country. Price volatility makes both producers and consumers increasingly
susceptible to poverty. (WFP, 2012, 20)

How much a household spends on food is one of the ways to measure accessibility, and

also their vulnerability to food insecurity in the future. A high proportion of household

expenditure on food means, “they will have limited reserve in meeting their food needs,”

(WFP, 2012, 24). The rate per household varies throughout the Philippines. The ARMM

region had the highest proportion of food expenditure per household at 84.5 percent in

2012. This region consists of predominantly Muslim provinces that have been in armed

conflict between the government and separatist groups for four decades (WFP, 2014).42

Zamboanga Peninsula (72.7 percent), CARAGA (69.6 percent), Bicol (68.6 percent),

Soccsksargen (68.3 percent), and Eastern Visayas (66.9 percent), also had more than two-

thirds of households where more than half of their income goes towards food expenditure

(WFP, 2012).

42
WFP. Philippines Overview. Accessed on November 17, 2014.
<http://www.wfp.org/countries/philippines/overview>
 Wiedemann 71

There are only four regions where less than half of families spend more than 50
percent of total expenditure on food and these could be assumed to have the best
overall food access, these being NCR 30.6 percent, CALABARZON 45.7 percent,
CAR 46.9 percent and Central Luzon 47.7 percent. (WFP, 2012, 24)

According to the BAS, 93 percent of the country’s total labor force was employed

in 2013. Thirty-one percent of the labor force was employed by the agriculture sector

(BAS, 2014). “In the first half of 2013, the daily nominal wage rates were PhP256.52

[$6.29 USD] for palay farm workers and PhP206.04 [$5.05 USD] for corn farm workers.

According to WFP, the National Capital Region that includes Manila, had the highest

unemployment rate, compared to other regions. “This is a clear indication of rural-urban

migration that is widely happening in the country as a livelihood strategy,” (WFP, 2012)

which has led to the growth of slums. The Greater Manila Area contains 21.5 million

people, or 22 percent of the nation’s population. Slum dwellers usually live in unsanitary

conditions, such as near garbage dumps, along rivers that simultaneously function as a

human waste and cleansing system. Open defecation is still being practiced by eight

percent of the population (WHO, 2011).

In response to the safety and nutritious requirements for food security, the

Philippines implemented the Republic Act No. 10611, also known as the Food Safety Act

of 2013. According to Philippine congress this act is, “an act to strengthen the food safety

regulatory system in the country to protect consumer health and facilitate market access

of local foods and food products, and for other purposes.” This Act holds the state

responsible for implementing policies and practices that will protect the public from

food-borne and water-borne illnesses and unsanitary handling of food from harvesting to

distribution.
 Wiedemann 72

Only four regions in the country have over 90 percent of families with access to
safe water: Central Luzon (96 percent), Cagayan Valley (93 percent), Ilocos (93
percent) and National Capital Region (92 percent). (WFP, 2012, 33)

This leaves 84 percent of households with access to safe water sources in 2012 (WFP,

2012, 31). That means sixteen percent of households depend on unprotected wells,

springs, rivers, and rainwater. This is a bigger problem during heavy rainy seasons,

flooding and natural disasters. For example, in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan there

was an outbreak of dysentery when the typhoon destroyed the city’s infrastructure, and

the people of Tacloban were faced with severe water and food shortages. As a

consequence of the inaccessibility of safe water sources, Filipinos prefer the higher costs

of bottled water to refilling stations “due to the presence of sediments and the

discoloration of water supple during heavy rains,” (WHO, 2012, 6). According to the

WHO, “water pollution, air pollution, poor sanitation, and unhygienic practice contribute

to an estimated 22% of all reported disease cases and nearly 6% of all reported deaths,”

(WHO, 2011, 6).

This section demonstrates how the country has made a lot of progress in reducing

food insecurity, and most importantly meeting their MDG target one goal. By

implementing the FSSP, the Philippines has been able to improve food availability by

increasing production for culturally appropriate foods, such as rice and fish. However, the

rate of food accessibility varies in different regions. There are only four regions in the

Philippines where less than half of households spend more than 50 percent on food. This

means most families in the Philippines have limited reserves in meeting their foods

needs, and as a nation they are highly vulnerable to food price fluctuations and income

reduction. In response to the safety and nutritious requirements for food security, the
 Wiedemann 73

Philippines is making an effort to improve water sanitation with the Food Safety Act of

2013 to mitigate the negative impacts of waterborne diseases. Additionally, given that 31

percent of the labor force is employed by the agriculture sector, household incomes are

susceptible to natural disasters, and climate change, which I will address in criterion four.

In the following section I discuss the Philippines’ ability to achieve the sustainability

criteria of food sovereignty.

5.2.2 Food Sovereignty Criterion 2: Food produced through ecologically sound and
sustainable methods. Sustainability means that agricultural methods consider the
interests and inclusion of the next generation.

As the Philippine government is pushing for national staple food self-sufficiency,

La Via Campesina members PARAGOS acknowledge that the government’s effort, “has

zeroed-in on the promotion of sustainable agriculture, and subsequently organic

farming,” (Tadeo, Baladad, 2012, 4).

For decades, the country’s agricultural sector has faced almost insurmountable
odds; problem so complex, it utterly contributes to the persistence of rural
poverty. These problems are deeply rooted to the “Green Revolution” which, for
the past 40 years, have been the anchor for the agricultural programs implemented
by the Government. The Green Revolution has systematically molded the
country’s rice production through the following means: (a) increase in rice mono-
cropping; (b) increase in the use of hybrid seed varieties; (c) increase in the use of
chemical fertilizers; (d) increase in the use of pesticides; and, (e) increase in the
use of powertillers. (Zamora, 2009) (Tadeo, Baladad, 2012, 4-5)

For example, Robin Broad, a professor at the International Development Program at

American University and John Cavanagh director of the Institute for Policy Studies,

studied Filipino farmers in Mindanao who were converting from chemical farming to

organic farming in 2010. Broad and Cavanagh argue that environmental degradation

brought on by the Green Revolution contributed to the farmers’ poverty. These peasant
 Wiedemann 74

farmers were in a vicious cycle of debt in order to purchase the paraphernalia needed to

sustain HYVs of rice. However, environmental degradation, climate change and natural

disaster coupled with population growth are now threatening the current state of

sustainability in the Philippines.

As stated earlier, the Brundtland Commission defines sustainability as

“development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of

future generations to meet their own needs,” and, “that societies meet human needs both

by increasing productive potential and by ensuring equitable opportunities for all,” (1987,

chapter 2). As of 2014, the population total of the Philippines is 98.39 million people

with a consistent 1.7 percent population growth rate (World Bank, 2014). According to

the UN, the Philippine population total is expected to increase to 130 million by 2050.43

To meet the needs of a growing Philippine population, the government should increase

agricultural productivity by optimizing sustainability. To do this it needs to address the

current state of environmental degradation, natural disaster, and climate change, and the

potential risks that arise from each problem.

Economics has not been good at taking environmental impacts into account . . .
This is a wholly inadequate characterization of the elementary fact that economic
activity is absolutely dependent on the goods and services supplied by the natural
environment. Any aspiration for sustainable economic growth must start from the
recognition of the need for the sustainable use of resources and ecosystems.
(Ekins, 2011, 630)

In previous sections I have shown that agriculture is a vital sector to national economy,

employing 31 percent of the labor force and contributing to 11.8 percent of the GDP in

2012. The archipelagic country has an area of 115,831 square miles (300,000 km2),

43
UN, Department of Economics and Social Affairs. (2013). World Population Ageing 1950-2050: Philippines.
Accessed on November 23, 2014.
<http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/worldageing19502050/pdf/164phili.pdf>
 Wiedemann 75

where 40.6 percent was dedicated to agricultural land in 2011 (World Bank, 2013).44

“The top four crops with the highest hectarage are coconuts (3.33 million ha), followed

by rice (2.47 million ha), corn (1.35 million ha), and sugarcane (0.36 million ha),” (Cruz

et al, 2013, 53). Also, among the forestland, 69 percent or ten million ha are dedicated to

timberland.

Since the UNFCCC COP-13 in Bali in 2007, the Philippine government

implemented a forest protection plan to protect the climate, conserve biodiversity, and

improve the livelihoods of locals by implementing the Philippine National REDD

(Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation)-Plus Strategy

(PRNRPS).

Deforestation contributed to three-fourths of the forests where only six to eight

percent of the country’s forest remains . . . 21 percent of the Philippine vertebrates
and over half of the known plant species are already threatened. (CCC, 2012, 14)

Since the 1900 when the American Congress passed the Public Land Act (1902) and the

Rice Share Tenancy Act (1933), the rate of deforestation increased to 203,000 ha per year

from 1935-1970. With these acts Filipinos were entitled to land in order to convert forest

into settlements and agricultural areas (GIZ, 2013). However, during the Green

Revolution many farmers became nomadic, moving whenever they experienced two to

three seasons of unproductive yields from nutrient deficient soils (GIZ, 2013). “Thus

migrant farmers were forced to clear additional areas for [clearing], leaving the

unproductive farms to fallow and return to the original [clearing] after several years,”

(GIZ, 2013, 41).

The second threat to sustainability is natural disaster. According to the FAO,

throughout the world “an average of 500 weather-related disasters are now taking place
44
Bureau of Agricultural Statistics, Philippines. Accessed on September 2013. <http://countrystat.bas.gov.ph/?cont=3>
 Wiedemann 76

each year, compared to 120 in the 1980s, and the number of floods has increased six-fold

over the same period,” (2008, 8). As the Philippines is located along the Ring of Fire and

along a typhoon belt, it is prone to volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, typhoons, heavy

down pour and floods. The Philippine Area of Responsibility (PAR) reports that there are

no changes in the frequency of cyclones, average of 20 cyclones per year. “However,

there is a very slight increase in the number of tropical cyclones with maximum sustained

winds of greater than 150kph [93mph] and above (typhoon category) being exhibited

during [the] El Niño event,” (PAGASA, 2011, 17). The latest extreme event was in 2013,

when the Philippines experienced one of the strongest typhoons ever recorded globally -

Typhoon Haiyan.

Finally, given that agriculture is inherently threatened by climate change, this is

also another threat to sustainability. The Philippines has experienced an increase in

annual mean temperature of 0.57°C from 1951 to 2009. From 1880 to 2010, the average

rate of sea level rise in the Philippines was 1.4 mm per year (PAGASA, 2011, 15).

Despite the threat of sea level rise, the Philippines is more concerned with those areas

that experience extreme annual tidal cycles. For example, the 190 km coastline of Manila

Bay has a tidal cycle that ranges from -0.475 m to 0.529 m. These tidal cycles coupled

with the heavy rainy season are responsible for flooding disasters across the Philippines.

This is a problem due to slum dwellers encroaching along the coast, because these areas

allow them to maintain their livelihoods, such as fish for consumption or bathe for

hygiene.

Therefore, how do we examine the risks of these threats? The best way to analyze

the adverse impacts of environmental degradation, natural disaster and climate change is
 Wiedemann 77

to use the risk equation used among scientist who study risks, hazards and disasters

(Gibb, Veuthey, 2011).

Risks = Hazard x Vulnerability

The amount of risk depends on both variables in the equation. The likelihood and
intensity of a hazard play a role: a super-typhoon is riskier than a light rain
shower. However, it is only when an exposed population and infrastructure (e.g.,
rice paddies, plantations, farmhouses, field-to-market roads, granaries, etc.) are
vulnerable that a hazard can lead to disaster. (Gibb, Veuthey, 2011, 343)

We do not have to address the hazards side of this equation because they cannot be

prevented rather we can reduce vulnerability by enhancing food sovereignty (Gibb,

Veuthey, 2011, 343). “For example, people may knowingly increase their vulnerability to

landslides because they have no choice but to deforest or intensify farming on steep

slopes to sustain their food needs,” (Gibb, Veuthey, 2011, 343).

Food production is the most vulnerable to hazards by displacing farmers and by

crippling their means of production. For instance, before the Mount Pinatubo eruption in

1991 nearly 10 percent of the population of Bacolor worked in the agricultural sector.

Consequently, over the next five years lahars45 continued to flood irrigation lines and

destroy crops that ultimately led to zero percent of the population working in the

agricultural sector (Gibb, Veuthey, 2011).

By diversifying production, farmers can reduce the negative impacts of

environmental degradation, natural disasters and climate change. For example,

diversifying agricultural production can mitigate the impacts brought on by mono-

cropping, such as nutrient deficient soil, which would also alleviate unnecessary

deforestation. As far as natural disasters, if a region like Tacloban only grows coconut

trees, a typhoon (like Typhoon Haiyan), can eliminate the area’s main source of
45
Instead of lava flow, lahar is flowing murky water due to volcanic sediments.
 Wiedemann 78

livelihoods. Typhoon Haiyan destroyed 33 million coconut trees, which can take up to six

to eight years for coconut trees to bring farmers income again. Diversifying farms could

also lower the vulnerability brought on by climate change.

Specifically, a “diversified farm means that the risk of crop loss due to pests,
diseases and calamity is minimized” because “different crop shave different levels
of resilience to pest and disease outbreaks and to extreme climatic events”
(Bachmann, Cruzada, and Wright 2009, 23). Thus, biodiversity and income
diversity help to secure food sovereignty on a temporal scale, by ensuring a more
consistent cash flow and food sources throughout the year. (Gibb, Veuthey, 2011,
348)

MASIPAG46 is a Philippine NGO that is implementing programs to increase agricultural

biodiversity in the Philippines (Gibb, Veuthey, 2011). This will help mitigate

environmental degradation, and bring resilience to local communities in the aftermath of

a natural disaster or climate change-induce negative impacts.

These threats can also have a range of adverse impacts on distribution. During

Typhoon Ondoy in 2009, some food traders lost up to 100 percent of their food stores,

plus the costs of transportation, storage and vegetables rose (Gibb, Veuthey, 2011).

The major business-related constraints they faced were[:] poor food quality (84
percent), high buying price (76 percent), lack of demand (75 percent), lack of
credit (67 percent), irregular supply (67 percent), transportation challenges (53
percent), storage constraints (44 percent), and food aid (33 percent). (Gibb,
Veuthey, 2011, 352)

The level at which a natural disaster interferes with distribution can range from the halt of

disaster aid flowing in to agricultural production flowing out of the city, therefore

interrupting the regions economic development.

In this section I demonstrate how the link between hazards such as environmental

degradation, natural disasters, climate change, and their negative impacts on agricultural

46
MASIPAG is an acronym for Magsasaka at Siyentipiko para sa Pag-unlad ng Agrikultura (Farmer-Scientist
Partnership for Development).
 Wiedemann 79

production, identifies risks that affect food sovereignty. A small archipelagic country like

the Philippines has limited natural resources to sustain a staple food sufficiency plan,

especially when it is prone to natural disasters and with a population expected to reach

130 million people by 2050. “Any aspiration for sustainable economic growth must start

from the recognition of the need for the sustainable use of resources and ecosystems,”

because an “indefinite physical expansion of the human economy on a finite planet is

impossible,” (Ekins, 2011, 630). In the following section I will discuss the Philippines’

ability to define their food and agriculture system.

5.2.3 Food Sovereignty Criterion 3: Right to define their food and agriculture
systems, where “their” prioritizes local and national economies and markets rather
than the demands of markets and corporations.

President Benigno Aquino III along with his Secretary of Agriculture Proceso

Alcala implemented FSSP in order to augment the Philippines’ right to control or define

its own food system. According to Alcala, “the present administration recognizes that it is

not simply agriculture that deserves more attention. It is the farmer, for the farmer is truly

central to these plans. The Food Staples Sufficiency Program is a plan anchored on the

farmer,” (2012, iii). However, the Philippine government also understands that it is under

constraints to maintain national staple food self-sufficiency and the demands from WTO

since it became a member in 1995. So, Alcala further states, “we will continue to employ

traditional strategies and approaches that have worked. However, where the strategies

and plans failed to deliver the desired results, innovations are in order,” (2012, iii).

The most recent phase of the development of the global agrifood system has been
marked by the effort to establish the World Trade Organization, which would
promote the expansion and hegemony of corporate industrial agriculture through
 Wiedemann 80

the institutionalization of free trade rules and monopolistic intellectual property

rights favoring the spread of globally integrated production chains. These chains
consist of big input producers, big farms, and big retailers serving a global
supermarket of elite and middle-class consumers. (Bello, 2009, 38)

Walden Bello has written that Marcos committed a lot of wrongs during his dictatorship,

but during his reign the Philippines was at least rice self-sufficient. It was not until the

Philippines joined the WTO in 1995 that agricultural production declined, because it no

longer had control of its own food system. The concept of neoliberalism stemmed from

two assumptions born out of multinational corporations, governments, food aid and

multilateral institutions.

The first is that devoting more production (be it agriculture, manufacturing, or

services) to trade will increase efficiencies, thereby delivering higher levels of
production at cheaper prices. The second is that modernization in general and the
latest technological discoveries in particular will increase productivity and
prosperity. (Broad, Cavanagh, 2012, 1182)

As stated earlier, when the Philippine government became a member of the WTO in 1995

it was forbidden to set quotas on agricultural imports, plus it was required to set low tariff

rates on a certain percentage of each commodity (Bello, 2009). This process is called

tarrification (Manoz, 2007). By doing this, the state became disinterested in investing in

the agricultural sector because it was cheaper to import food then to produce it, and the

government ultimately ended up importing more in order to supply local demands. This

led to the decline in rice self-sufficiency, and ultimately food sovereignty, and the

country fell behind the production rate of its top two suppliers, Thailand and Vietnam.

Imports of rice rose from 263,000 MT in 1995 to 2.1 million MT in 1998 (Bello, 2009).

The Rice Crisis of 2008 proved these two assumptions wrong. Most importantly,

the crisis exposed the Philippines’ vulnerability to the international trade market (Broad

and Cavanagh, 2012), for example, when the price of rice almost tripled between 2007
 Wiedemann 81

and 2008 (Regalado, 2010, 22). The sudden increase in rice prices had the largest impact

on import-dependent countries, such as the Philippines. According to the World Rice

Statistics, the Philippines was the largest global importer of rice in 2008, importing

almost 1.8 million tons.47

What is key to emphasize is that these post-2008 vulnerabilities faced by many

nations were the result of conscious policies. Vulnerability need not have been a
given; vulnerability was created and enhanced by neoliberal policies. Nations
became vulnerable to food price hikes because policies encouraged food imports.
Nations became vulnerable to financial crisis because their banking systems were
consciously opened to global short-term portfolio investment flows. Countries’
forests and fishing grounds became vulnerable as they became the source of
‘miracle exports’ and were further opened to plunder by foreign firms. (Broad and
Cavanagh, 2012, 1183)

In 2012, the WTO’s latest Trade Policy Review on the Philippines reported that it

is performing well under its relatively open trade regime showing an annual GDP growth

rate of five percent from 2005-2011, and that its trade policy has not had any major

changes since 2005.

The Philippines maintains its overall policy of ensuring that key sectors are
effectively controlled by Filipinos and remain restricted for foreign investors,
notably agriculture, fisheries, and a large number of services. As a result, FDI
[foreign direct investments] inflows are low compared with other countries in the
region. While the Government has expressed concern, no concrete changes are
foreseen to open up these sectors to foreign investment . . . The tariff remains the
main policy instrument . . . tariffs average 10.2% (10.3% in 2004) on agriculture .
. . Imports of some goods are prohibited and few very sensitive goods, notably
rice, are subject to import quotas. The rice quota was to be phased out by 2005,
but the Philippines obtained a seven-year extension (until 30 June 2012) within
the WTO. (WTO, 2012, 1-3)

According to the WTO, tariffs are the main trade policy instruments in Philippine

agricultural trade. However, the concept of import tariffs as an efficient instrument for

improving a market-oriented economy has been widely debated. Supranational

47
IRRI. Why does the Philippines import rice? Accessed on November 30th, 2014. <http://irri.org/news/hot-topics/why-
does-the-philippines-import-rice>
 Wiedemann 82

organizations like WTO believe tariffs impose barriers to trade, because they are counter-

productive to the liberalization of agricultural markets since they are government

imposed. Others, like Bello, argue that import tariffs protect domestic farmers from a

neoliberal international trade market.

According to Ph.D. candidate of agricultural economics, Preceles Hernandez

Manzo, under Annex five of the UR Agreement on Agriculture, the Philippines can delay

the tarrification of rice, which was due to expire in June 2012. The Philippines requested

the delay because exposing the country’s staple food to the open market meant it could be

subjected to the adverse impacts felt during the Rice Crisis of 2008.

This section is important for my argument because in order for the Philippines to

strengthen food sovereignty in an economy that is highly dependent on rice for

consumption and income, the Philippine government instituted the FSSP plan. The

government realizes that in order for the country to be rice self-sufficient it must keep up

with the national demand plus have reserves in times of emergency, such as natural

disasters. The government hopes to achieve national rice self-sufficiency by investing in

the construction of irrigation and farm-to-market roads, research and development on

flood- and drought- tolerant staple food varieties, crop diversity and domestic investment.

However in the following section, I will discuss the Philippines’ lack of ability to put

peasant farmers or local communities at the core of food sovereignty.

5.2.4 Food Sovereignty Criterion 4: The aspirations and needs of those who
produce, distribute and consume food are at the heart of food systems and policies,
and empowers peasant and family farmer-driven agriculture, and it ensures their
rights to use and manage lands.
 Wiedemann 83

La Via Campesina member PARAGOS argues that the government’s FSSP plan

is reminiscent of the Green Revolution, so PARAGOS farmers are looking towards

alternative sustainable methods that produce higher yields. Otherwise, like Alcala states

these farmers will be subjected to use innovative methods, such as genetically modified

technologies. This is an example of Agarwal’s argument that there are local

environmental and political constraints that dictate a peasant’s method of farming.

Broad and Cavanagh wanted to understand the constraints farmers face to better

understand the on-the-ground realities of peasant farmers versus the global debate. In

2010, they interviewed rice farmers in Mindanao, in Southern Philippines. These

communities were in the cusp of switching from chemical to organic farming. The

outcome of that study was that the biggest constraints on farmers were costs and yields.

When farmers first went into chemical farming, the cost of chemical farming for hybrid

seeds, chemical fertilizers, pesticides and irrigation were subsidized. Since the

implementation of the FSSP, subsidies on seeds and fertilizers were lifted, and the price

of rice went up, which was determined by the market. This perpetuated a cycle of debt for

the farmers, so the switch to an organic method meant they did not have to depend on

loans made necessary with the chemical method (Broad, Cavanagh, 2012).

According to data from the Philippine Development Assistance Program, on a

national level, rice yields of organic rice-farmers after 3-5 years ranged from 100-
130 sacks/hectare (ha), while the national average for hybrid rice was only about
80 to 100 sacks/ha (from author’s interviews; Garcia 2008). (Broad, Cavanagh,
2012, 1186)

Farmers told Broad and Cavanagh that the first two to three seasons produced low-yields

due to the nutrient deficient soil from years of chemical farming, but once the soil healed

the majority experienced equal or higher yields.

 Wiedemann 84

This section is important to my argument because it demonstrates how the

Philippines is under constraints to achieve national rice self-sufficiency, and maintain its

obligations to implement tarrification as a WTO member. While it was assumed by

supranational organizations that the liberalization of markets would increase agricultural

production and produce cheaper prices, the Rice Crisis of 2008 proved this assumption

incorrect. The reality is that supranational organizations forced governments to

implement policies that will either push for national self-sufficiency at a high production

cost that leads to higher food prices, or subject farmers to an international market-

oriented economy where they have to compete with cheap imports. In the following

section, I discuss the food inequities aspect of food sovereignty.

5.2.5 Food Sovereignty Criterion 5: Implies new social relations free of oppression
and inequality between men and women, peoples, racial groups, social and economic
classes and generations.

Worldwide an estimated 60% of undernourished people are women or girls . . . A

cross-country study of developing countries covering the period 1970-1995 found
that 43% of the reduction of hunger that occurred was attributable to progress in
women’s education . . . An additional 12% of the reduction of hunger was
attributable to increased life expectancy of women . . . Thus, fully 55% of the
gains against hunger in these countries during those 25 years were due to the
improvement of women’s situation within society. (FAO, ADB 2013, 1)

According to the WFP, 93.1 percent of women and 92.4 percent of men were employed

in the Philippines as of 2012 (WFP, 2012). However, a 2009 study conducted in the

Philippines revealed that high concentrations of Filipinas were employed in the informal

sector, including unskilled and semi-skilled jobs with low pay levels. Most importantly,

women were more likely to be the first to lose their jobs in times of crisis, and were more

likely to “suffer heavily from a decline in living standards,” (FAO, 2013, 15).
 Wiedemann 85

According to the FAO, “for women, land is a pivotal resource for meeting

subsistence needs, and for accessing other goods and services, such as credit. Access to

credit often depends on the ability to use land as collateral,” (2013, 24). In 2012, a little

more than ten percent of women owned land in the Philippines. With equal access to land

women could have access to credit and make farming decisions, which could increase

yields and agricultural output. This is particularly more important today due to the

agrarian transition were, “men tend to exit first from agriculture, resulting in growing

feminization of agriculture . . . is reflected in the high proportion of women whose main

employment is in agriculture,” (FAO, 2013, 19-20).

In this Data and Findings section, I argue that maintaining national food

sovereignty is not sustainable for every country. This thesis paper examines “why” in the

case of the Philippines. I have divided the definition of food sovereignty into five

separate criteria. However, I demonstrated the challenges in achieving or maintaining

each criterion for the Philippines. The Philippines has met their MDG target one goal,

which is to halve the number of people suffering from undernourishment. The

government plays an active role in permitting farmers to use sustainable methods, but its

main goal is to achieve food sovereignty at the national level. By implementing the FSSP

the Philippines is able to increase production for culturally appropriate foods, such as rice

and fish. However, as a small archipelagic country prone to natural disaster coupled with

population growth, it will be difficult to maintain food sovereignty without

transformations in the global food system. In the following section, I highlight the over-

arching themes and summarize my thesis.

 Wiedemann 86

Chapter VI: Summary and Conclusion

6.1 Summarizing the Challenges Posed to Food Sovereignty in Developing

Countries.

In the previous chapter, I identified a number of challenges in achieving food

sovereignty in the Philippines. In this final chapter I summarize these challenges

according to themes. The first theme includes the socio-economic and political

challenges, such as achieving national food staple self-sufficiency. The second theme

includes environmental, such as environmental degradation and natural disasters. The

third theme includes cultural and educational challenges.

6.1.1 Socio-Economic Challenge

At the turn of the 20th century, a combination of events would set the stage that

led to the burgeoning of U.S. industrialized agriculture and simultaneously to the rise of

the Philippines’ dependence on staple food imports, such as rice. Just before the end of

World War II, the Bretton Woods Conference established an agenda to promote

worldwide economic stability and forestall any possible global financial crisis. This gave

birth to the World Bank, the IMF, and International Trade Organizations. However,

Europe had difficulty recovering from World War II, which stalled global financial

growth. Therefore under the Marshall Plan, the United States aided fourteen European

countries. Aid helped reconstruct Europe, but most notably it thrust U.S. hegemony over

worldwide foreign policy and US-led multilateralism.

 Wiedemann 87

At the same time, the Philippines gained independence from the United States and

recovered from the Japanese Occupation in 1946. However, the sixth president of the

Republic of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos, was the most notorious president. In his

reign the Philippine economy spiraled down due to the increasing reliance on foreign

funds coupled with government corruption and the institution of martial law. However,

he was able to achieve national rice self-sufficiency with help of the Green Revolution.

In the 1980s, the World Bank and IMF instituted structural adjustment programs

by requiring budget-cuts and free market conditions for debtor countries reliant on

foreign funds or foreign aid. The Philippine government was among the first guinea pigs

of the structural adjustment reforms. According to Bello, import tariffs that once

protected manufacturers in the Philippines went from 44 percent to 20 percent, which

ended up bankrupting many domestic industries. For example, the textile industry went

from two hundred companies to ten. In addition, the debt in the Philippines more than

doubled in ten years making it more reliant on foreign aid.

By 1996, the WTO made it hard for small-scale farmers, particularly in

developing countries, to sell staple crops in the international trade market amidst heavily

subsidized multinational food corporations. According to Bello, when the Philippine

government became a member of the WTO in 1995 it was forbidden to set quotas on

agricultural imports, plus it was required to set low tariff rates on a certain percentage of

each commodity imported (2009, 60). Ultimately, this led to the decline in rice self-

sufficiency and the country fell behind the production rate of its top two suppliers,

Thailand and Vietnam.

 Wiedemann 88

6.1.2 Environmental Challenge

As Carl Sagan and the Brundtland Commission assert, the view of Earth from

space is a humbling experience as it demonstrates a ball dominated by patterns of clouds,

oceans, and greenery suspended in the vastness of space. This is the best demonstration

of the arrogance of human self-importance. A reminder that this planet will continue to

exist without us, and the survival of mankind will depend on the Earth’s capacity to

provide the necessary ingredients for agricultural production: sun, air, soil, and water.

Mankind has invented industrialized agriculture that can produce food at a rate

that outpaces population growth, but this development contributes to negative impacts on

the environment. The introduction of extra greenhouse gas emissions into the

environment by pumping fossil fuel out of the ground has led to human-induced global

climate change, and the over-use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides has led to

widespread environmental degradation. Most importantly, peasant farmers are bearing

the brunt of these environmental impacts as environmental degradation impedes their

ability to grow crops necessary for their livelihoods. The concept of sustainability, as

introduced by the Brundtland Commission, was an outcome of the growing negative

impacts of industrialized regions.

The Green Revolution era in the Philippines is a prime example of the socio-

economic and environmental negative impacts of industrialized agriculture. The Green

Revolution benefited large-scale, industrialized farmers as they could afford to maintain

HYVs while doubling their yields. This also gave developed countries and multinational

food corporations a leg up on dominating the global food system. When the Rockefeller

and Ford Foundations established the International Rice Research Institute in 1960, only
 Wiedemann 89

large-scale industrial farmers could sustain the cost of HYV technologies. Small-scale

farmers did not anticipate the necessary increase in other related expenditures, such as

pesticides and fertilizers that were vital to the success of HYVs. As a consequence,

HYVs of rice deteriorated, and small-scale farmers began to mortgage and eventually

lose their land (Nadeau, 2008). Meanwhile, as shown in chapter five, the over use of

pesticides and fertilizers by farmers depleted the soil of essential nutrients for sufficient

agricultural production and increased deforestation.

The Brundtland Commission defines sustainability as “development that meets

the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet

their own needs,” and, “that societies meet human needs both by increasing productive

potential and by ensuring equitable opportunities for all,” (1987, chapter 2). As of 2014,

the population total of the Philippines is 98.39 million people and expected to increase to

130 million by 2050. Also, the small archipelagic country sits along the Ring of Fire and

a typhoon belt making it prone to natural disaster. The PAR reports that it experiences 20

cyclones per year on average. To meet the needs of a growing Philippine population, the

government should increase agricultural productivity by optimizing sustainability. To do

this it needs to address the current state of environmental degradation, natural disaster,

and climate change, and the potential risks that arise from each problem.

Ironically, the future of global food production is also threatened by these adverse

impacts. Without any efforts to achieve a sustainable food system, environmental

degradation will continue as poor countries cannot afford adaptation and mitigation

technologies.
 Wiedemann 90

6.1.3 Cultural and Educational Challenge

Rice is the staple food of the Philippines. Food is rooted in our culture and we

cannot easily ask citizens to reduce their intake or diversify their meal choices, so the

threat of biodiversity is constrained by our own cultural habits.

Decisions made at billions of dinner tables each day have a huge impact on the
farming paradigm. As the ‘Slow Food’ Movement (2012) phrases it, non-farming
consumers’ power depends on ‘voting with your fork’. The daily choice of how
much meat each of us eats influences how much food farmers must grow. Indeed,
by recent estimates, ‘nearly half’ of the grain currently harvested globally feeds
livestock and cattle (De Schutter 2010, 4). Instead of blaming people in poorer
countries for increasing meat demand, consumers in the United States and other
richer nations could take the lead to reduce our already high meat consumption,
thereby lessening the pressure to shift more land into food production. (Broad,
Cavanagh, 2012, 1189)

As Broad and Cavanagh assert, decisions are made at billions of dinner tables, and how

much we chose to eat influences how much food farmers have to grow. Obviously, some

foods have more negative impacts on the environment, such as meat. Livestock releases

more GHGs than the transportation sector. Most importantly, nearly half of grains

harvested are for livestock, because it takes six kilos of grain to produce one kilo of beef

(Collier, 2011).

Consumers have the power to transform the current state of our global food

system, and push for key policy decisions that will promote a more sustainable food

system. This cannot happen until consumers know what is at stake in the foods they

purchase, from production to consumption to waste.

 Wiedemann 91

6.2 Conclusion

La Via Campesina first introduced the concept of food sovereignty in 1996 in

hopes to challenge the current global food system, but the concept of food sovereignty

has been accepted uncritically. Proponents of food sovereignty such as Edelman et al,

Altieri, Shiva and Bello promote local self-sufficiency and bottom-up approaches. In

opposition, Collier argues that only industrialized agriculture, advanced technologies and

international trade liberalization can increase productivity. However, Agarwal, Issaoui-

Mansouri, and Bernstein are critical of the concept of food sovereignty. They argue that

efforts, such as food self-sufficiency, at the national or local level are not sustainable. I

agree with the latter that we must be more critical of the concept, because maintaining

national food sovereignty is not suitable for every country.

Since the Philippines’ independence from the United States in 1946, it was able to

achieve national rice self-sufficiency in the 1970s and 1980s due to the Green

Revolution, but at the cost to the environment and to economic prosperity. In addition,

the country’s involvement with the WTO required deregulation by trade liberalization.

The deregulation of international trade forced the Philippines to push for national self-

sufficiency by implementing the FSSP, which resulted in high production costs that led to

increased food prices. The deregulation also subjected Filipino farmers to an international

market-oriented economy where they have to compete with heavily subsidized

multinational food corporations.

My case study of the Philippines has examined the implications of maintaining

food sovereignty. By examining the evolution of the global food system in the literature

review and gathering challenges the Philippines faces in food sovereignty, I have argued
 Wiedemann 92

that national staple food self-sufficiency is not suitable for this country. My argument is

based on the challenges the Philippines faces in sustaining the five tenets of food

sovereignty.

Criterion 1: The right of people to access healthy and culturally appropriate food.

The Republic of the Philippines has made a lot of progress in reducing food

insecurity, and most importantly meeting their MDG target one goal to halve the number

of people suffering from undernourishment. The Philippines has also reduced their

overall Global Hunger Index score from 19.9 percent in 1990 to 13.2 percent in 2013.

Since the implementation of the FSSP there was a significant reduction in rice imports

from 2.4 million MT in 2010 to 398,000 MT in 2013 (BAS, 2013). This means that the

country is 97 percent rice self-sufficient, and is also 99 percent tilapia self-sufficient two

of the countries staple foods (BAS, 2013). However, the cost of these domestic products

remains higher than before the Rice Crisis of 2008 and compared to prices in the

international trade market.

Another major problem with Filipinos right to healthy food is their access to safe

water sources. According to the WHO, “water pollution, air pollution, poor sanitation,

and unhygienic practice contribute to an estimated 22% of all reported disease cases and

nearly 6% of all reported deaths,” (WHO, 2011, 6).

Criterion 2: Food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods.

Sustainability means that agricultural methods consider the interests and inclusion
of the next generation.
 Wiedemann 93

The government plays an active role in sustainability development, due to its

understanding of the negative impacts of the Green Revolution on environmental

degradation, deforestation and widespread poverty among peasant farmers. Even the local

La Via Campesina organization, PARAGOS, recognizes the Philippine government’s

efforts to encourage sustainable farming (Tadeo, Baladad, 2012). However, maintaining

staple food self-sufficiency will not be possible for a growing population, in a

geographically small country, especially a country that is highly prone to natural

disasters. Eventually, food demands will outpace production as the Philippines’

population is expected to reach 130 million by 2050 (UN DESA, 2013).

The frequency of natural disasters has devastated many regions in the Philippines,

most importantly farming regions. Rather than increasing staple food production, farmers

can diversify crops to reduce the negative impacts of environmental degradation, natural

disasters and climate change. Diversification can mitigate the negative impacts brought

on by extensive mono-cropping, such as nutrient deficient soil, which would also

alleviate unnecessary deforestation.

Criterion 3: Right to define their food and agriculture systems, where “their”
prioritizes local and national economies and markets rather than the demands of
markets and corporations.

The Philippine government understands that it is under constraints to maintain

national staple food self-sufficiency plus the demands from the WTO. As a member, the

Philippines was forbidden to set quotas on agricultural imports, and it was required to set

low tariff rates on a certain percentage of each commodity (Bello, 2009). With that said,

the neoliberal Western style of the global food system has cornered the Philippines into
 Wiedemann 94

its current predicament, because now it no longer had control of its own food system.

Currently, the government has implemented the FSSP in hopes that by investing in self-

sufficiency it can prevent the economy from being subjected to the adverse impacts felt

during the Philippine Rice Crisis of 2008. However, as I point out this is not ultimately

sustainable.

Criterion 4: The aspirations and needs of those who produce, distribute and
consume food are at the heart of food systems and policies, and empowers peasant
and family farmer-driven agriculture, and it ensures their rights to use and manage
lands.

Both neo-liberal policies and environmental factors have caused the decline of the

small-scale farmers, which prevents successful food self-sufficiency. The Philippine

government welcomes alternative sustainable methods (WFP, 2012). However, due to the

goals of FSSP if these methods do not produce higher yields the farmers will be

pressured to use modern technologies, such as GM technologies. Since the

implementation of the FSSP, subsidies on seeds and fertilizers were lifted, and the price

of rice went up. This perpetuated a cycle of debt for the farmers. The switch to an organic

method meant they did not have to depend on loans that were necessary with the

chemical method (Broad, Cavanagh, 2012). Although the goal is to encourage sustainable

farming methods, the government’s action to lift subsidies on seeds and fertilizers puts

farmers in the position of risking future agricultural production, the main source of their

livelihoods. According to Broad and Cavanaugh, the government’s action has given

farmers an ultimatum, which is the opposite of empowering them. Farmers have a choice

to either: (1) adopt GM technologies, risking health side effects, increasing local

environmental degradation, and increasing debt; or (2) risk agricultural production by

 Wiedemann 95

switching over to organic farming methods, which is not a viable alternative for flood-

prone areas. However, I agree with Bernstein that the radical goals of food sovereignty

push solely for the second ultimatum, which ignores the rights of farmers to democratic

choice, especially given there are no other alternative farming methods.

Criterion 5: Implies new social relations free of oppression and inequality between
men and women, peoples, racial groups, social and economic classes and
generations.

According to the FAO, “for women, land is a pivotal resource for meeting

subsistence needs, and for accessing other goods and services, such as credit. Access to

credit often depends on the ability to use land as collateral,” (2013, 24). In 2012, a little

more than ten percent of women owned land in the Philippines. With equal access to land

women could have access to credit and make farming decisions, which could increase

yields and agricultural output. This is particularly more important today due to the

concept of agrarian transition where, “men tend to exit first from agriculture, resulting in

growing feminization of agriculture,” (FAO, 2013, 19-20). However, the concept of food

sovereignty is not the only way to achieve gender equality. There are other methods, such

as the Sustainable Development Goals, which has a goal to reduce inequality too.
 Wiedemann 96

6.3 Broader Implications

Figure 10: Theoretical Framework

As demonstrated in this research paper, this framework provides an analytical tool

to research every country, and their unique challenges in maintaining or achieving food

sovereignty. This is in comparison to confining each country to universal solutions

created by multinational organizations, such as the “Right to Food Guidelines” (p. 17).

Conversely, La Via Campesina’s efforts to create an all-inclusive definition for food

sovereignty tries to accommodate the unique challenges of peasant farmers. However,

this concept still disregards food sovereignty at a national scale (p. 28), disregards a

farmer’s right to democratic choice (p. 31), and romanticizes the “peasant” farmer (p.

32). Upholding a “universal solution” furthers the dichotomy of multilateral agreements

and revolutionist. What we end up with is unique countries whose challenges become

irrelevant, and eventually neglected.

 Wiedemann 97

6.4 Recommendation

I recommend that proponents of food sovereignty consider the challenges the

Philippines will have in maintaining this concept. While the concept is ideal, it is not

practical, and will threaten the state of the country’s agricultural sustainability. The

Philippines will have to depend on food imports, and therefore depend on the

international trade market. I recommend that the Philippines lower its goals to achieve

absolute national staple food self-sufficiency, particularly for rice, by (1) increasing food

imports, (2) investing in safe water resources and infrastructure, (3) investing in crop

diversification and (4) implementing mitigation policies.

First, the population of the Philippines is expected to increase to 130 million by

2050 (UN, 2013). In addition, the percentage of Filipinos living in cities and urban areas

is expected to increase from 50 percent in 2013 to 84 percent by 2050 (UN Habitat,

2013). This means the Philippines will have to keep up with a growing demand,

especially in order to feed a growing urban population. By increasing, but regulating,

food imports the country can mitigate the adverse impacts of industrialized agriculture

and sustain the environment for future generations.

Second, with a growing urban population the Philippines needs to reallocate its

investment in FSSP to investment in safe water sources and infrastructure, particularly in

its slum dwelling regions where unhygienic and unsanitary practices contribute to disease

and death.

Third, as a disaster prone country the Philippine government should decrease its

vulnerability to natural disaster and climate change risk by diversifying crop production

and having reserves in preparation for the next natural disaster. While the Philippines has
 Wiedemann 98

a natural disaster risk plan titled the Natural Disaster Risk Management in the

Philippines, it has not yet shown a successful demonstration of resilience.

Fourth, supranational trade organizations, such as the WTO, and multinational

food corporations together with the Philippines, should open a dialogue to address the

adverse impacts of food dependency, such as vulnerability to future price volatility for

staple foods. For the reason, that there maybe misinterpretations between the

international level of analysis, the WTO itself, and possibly the Philippines’

interpretation of international policies. This dialogue could potentially lead to the

implementation of mitigation policies that will alleviate the challenges the Philippines

faces in a neoliberal global food system.

 Wiedemann 99

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