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Definitely, nothing good can be said about the
Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP). An unbiased evaluation
of CARP is one of two sentences:
1. It is a monumental failure.
2. It is a centerpiece program
unblemished by success.
The allegation that there are
more crooks at the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) than at the
usual seats of official corruption (Customs, BIR, and DPWH) has
believers in areas that have seen contentious and bloody land
disputes.
I myself had been a victim of the
vast web of corruption that has plagued the DAR and the entire land
redistribution system. The problem was the man who got the tenancy
status to a small piece of land I had been tilling for years was
poorer than me. He had nothing. I still have land to till despite
the land grab. My inaction was the equivalent of condoning evil. But
my conscience said it is not just to move against somebody who is
poorer than me.
Of the tens of thousands of
agrarian reform communities (ARCs) organized across the country, not
one is thriving. The model agrarian community dreamed of by the
framers of the CARP law remains an elusive dream. After the
government support waned, the ARCs reverted to what they were
before—hamlets of grinding poverty.
A sizable part of the land reform
titles called CLOAs, or certificate of land ownership agreements,
are no longer with the original beneficiaries. Roughly 50 percent of
the original beneficiaries had resold their land to wealthier
neighbors, to land developers, to the original landowners.
Worse was the violence agrarian
issues triggered. In Pampanga alone, there is a long list of
tenants, landowners, lawyers and real estate brokers murdered in the
name of agrarian reform.
The long history of bungling,
corruption and failure is the reason why, for the first time in
Congress, the conservative, right-wing elements now sing a common
tune with those on the left. Both groups reject the proposal to
extend CARP for five years. They have one message—the scuttling of
CARP—despite the divergent arguments.
But is scuttling CARP in line
with good public policy? Do we really need to kill the CARP for
good, say good riddance and then write a blistering obituary?
The problem with killing CARP is
the absence of a substitute program. Kill CARP now and the land
redistribution program will be mothballed for good. The feudal land
structure will make a grand comeback.
The landlord class of the old is
the capitalist/investor class now. Give them an opening and they
will consolidate anew the land they lost to agrarian reform. They
will usher in the return of the old haciendas, the old owner-serf
relationship between landowners and farm workers.
The return of the haciendas will
be an economic disaster. Land consolidation, while it may achieve
the much-touted “ economies of scale” in agricultural
production, will return the struggling tenant-beneficiaries
into agricultural wage earners, which is worse. Instead of expanding
the country’s center, the middle class via the empowered
former tenants now with their own land, the relationship will
be back to the medieval structure – the nabobs of the land and
their exploited workers.
We can’t go back to this.
CARP should be extended. The
tragic history of failure and corruption should be used by
Congress to leverage for reforms, fundamental reforms that will
hopefully lead to the full blossoming, a few years from now, of
vibrant and economically stable agrarian reform communities.
Where should the reforms
start?
The DAR should team up with the
DA to make sure agricultural investments are poured into the ARCs.
Irrigation, access to credit, production technologies and
post-harvest facilities should be provided to small-scale farmers in
the ARCs to double or triple their yield. Then, marketing tieups
should be forged with endusers or giant agribusiness integrators to
make sure there is enough profit after every harvest season.
If the government can organize
lectures and seminars from the NGOs espousing values and capability
building, the better. After harvest, farmers usually repair to
honky-tonks and tupadas.
There should be a ban on the sale
or transfer of the CLOA titles for 25 years. This is fair enough. A
land grant from the government should not be a negotiable instrument
within 25 years. If the farmers want production loans, they can get
it from banks and financial instrumentalities that have the mandate
to fully support beneficiaries of agrarian reform.
The state-run banks that are
mandated to support farmer-beneficiaries with credit should fulfill
their mandate. No quibbling, no temporizing, no tentativeness in
support of what is truly the greatest social justice program of
contemporary times.
mvrong@yahoo.com
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