PIPLINKS Press Release on Mining policy of philippines : QC IMC

PIPLINKS PRESS STATEMENT
By Geoff Nettleton on behalf of
Philippine Indigenous Peoples Links

Contact 09205028035

“Breaking Promises, Making Profits: Mining in the Philippines”

The report “Breaking Promises, Making Profits: Mining in the Philippines” is based in part on eight years of research on the issue by PIPLinks. It documents how mining devastates the lives of many poor farmers, fisherfolk and indigenous peoples. It contradicts the claims of the mining industry, World Bank and Philippine Government that mining brings poverty alleviation and development and is widely welcomed. Our research has shown that virtually all Philippine communities offered the prospect of mining development reject it. Even LGUs including the Capiz and Mindoro Oriental Provincial authorities and municipalities as far apart as Siocon, Zamboanga del Norte and Tadian, Mountain Province have gone on record to officially oppose mining.

Many rural communities fear mining will pollute and destroy the environment on which they depend. They fear loss of farmland and flooding from river valleys choked with mine waste as we have seen below the Lepanto, Marcopper and Atlas mines. They fear chemical pollution damaging fisheries, farms and human health.
“We will loose land that is sacred to us and provides for our needs. We do not believe the promise of long term jobs because we do not have the necessary skills. The bulldozer drivers and engineers come from other places.” Onsino Mato, Subanon leader.

Yet while many mining companies face strong opposition from communities their claims of community support are uncritically accepted by the DENR and MGB.
We have spoken to mining companies and communities in different regions. In virtually every case where companies claim to have gained community acceptance and the free prior informed consent of indigenous communities, as they are required by law, our research has found sustained strong opposition, and many who have not been informed at all. There are numerous serious anomalies. Community wishes and fears are being ignored, misrepresented and even suppressed by militarization. We give detailed accounts from Siocon. There are others elsewhere.

“The Government claims that there is a new sustainable and responsible mining. We have found no evidence of it outside of paper claims. Some of the foreign companies claiming to bring new high standards of practice have, in fact, little or no past record of actual mining at all. They include small and relatively under-resourced companies seeking quick profits by any means. Other companies involved include LepantoCMC, MMC, Benguet Corporation and others whose past practice has contributed directly to the current low credibility of the Philippine mining industry.” (Geoff Nettleton Coordinator PIPLinks.)

The influential pro-mining lobby claims the sector can help solve the debt crisis. This is a false and misleading claim. The Philippines is rich in minerals but they are widely scattered and mostly in low-grade deposits. To mine even a portion of these would require the excavation of many large mines and resultant increased impact. Keeping costs down would be essential and would probably result in increased open-pit mining, and more use of cheap forms of waste disposal including marine dumping. The one-sided talk of benefits also fails to consider the massive costs of mining in lost farming, fisheries and damage to irrigation and other infrastructure.

A recent report for the World Bank urged the Bank to reduce its investment in mining. It warned that where mining proceeds in the absence of effective measures to protect the rights of the poor and marginal and ensure broad distribution of any benefits then mining has in different countries not only failed to contribute to poverty alleviation or sustainable development but has led to impoverishment and abuse. Our research confirms to us that in relation to mining the Philippines remains a place where safeguards, though present in law, are largely absent in practice.

This report includes an appeal to Government to withdraw from its current role of active promotion of mining in favour of the traditional role of good government as regulator of what is a potentially seriously harmful business activities and protector and promoter of the rights of the poor and marginal.

In a previous generation the World Bank pressed the Philippines to exploit its forest wealth to generate growth and national development. Corrupt political interests readily agreed. The overexploitation of the Philippine forest resources that followed was the true cause of recent and past deforestation disasters. The promised development was never delivered to the people. We now stand on the eve of another assault on the already overstretched resilience of the Philippine environment in the name of development. We fear if it is allowed to proceed under current circumstances another round of mine-generated disasters will surely follow.

1. PIPLINKS is a UK based Human rights organisation that works in support of indigenous organisations in the protection and promotion of indigenous rights.

2. “Breaking Promises, Making Profits : Mining in the Philippines” A Christian Aid/PIPLinks Report published in December 2004

3. Extractive Industries Review was commissioned by the Bank and conducted by Dr. Emil Salim, former Environment minister in Indonesia.