GMA signs law extending CARP

PLARIDEL, Bulacan, Philippines — President Arroyo signed into law yesterday a measure extending the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) for another five years beginning July 2009 and allocating P1.5 billion for its implementation.

She said the law, which will implement the CARP with Extension and Reform (CARPER), is a continuation of the efforts of her father and the late former President Corazon Aquino to complete agrarian reform in the country.

Mrs. Arroyo signed Republic Act 9700 or the CARP Extension Law in simple ceremonies on the stage of the Don Ceasario San Diego Gym here that had a black and white picture of her father, the late President Diosdado Macapagal signing Agriculture Land Reform Code 46 years ago.

The signing was witnessed by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, Senators Gregorio Honasan, Aquilino Pimentel, Deputy Speaker Amelita Villarosa, House Majority Leader Arthur Defensor, and Reps. Rodolfo Antonino and Junie Cua as a crowd of over a thousand residents, farmer-beneficiaries, and government employees cheered.

“Agrarian reform should not merely subdivide…it must raise living standards. Ownership raises the farmer’s productivity that will keep him on his feet,” Mrs. Arroyo said.

“So we expect this Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension Law will help achieve our goal of productivity that will keep the emancipated farmer on his feet and raise living standards,” she said.

The President also announced that she ordered the drafting of a bill that would condone the principal of the debts of farmer-beneficiaries owed to government financial institutions, particularly the Land Bank of the Philippines.

She cited Mrs. Aquino for her efforts at agrarian reform and the CARPER was her administration’s way of showing “our solidarity with the late former President Corazon Aquino in our dream of liberating our farmer-beneficiaries from the claws of poverty.”

She recalled that the entire Macapagal family witnessed the law signed by her father in 1963 that began the country’s program for agrarian reform.

Under the law, CARPER would be provided a P150-billion budget distributed over five years, 40 percent of which would go to support services to make agricultural lands more productive, while the rest will be used for land acquisition and distribution.

“This law that he (Macapagal) signed abolished tenancy and prescribed a program for transforming the farmer tenants into lessees and then into owner-tillers,” the President said.

She pointed out that with the larger allocation of P150 billion, the CARP would be able to provide for the funding needs of farmer beneficiaries and further strengthen support services that would greatly help in increasing the productivity of their acquired land.

She noted that in her State of the Nation Address last year, she stressed the importance of improving the productivity of lands under CARPER.

“We must curb the recklessness that gives land without the means to make it productive,” she said. “This law (CARPER) thus provides the means to not only equitably distribute land but also make it productive by undertaking entrepreneurial activities such as agri-business.”

Agri-business, she said, are activities “that has something to do with agriculture with the farmer undertaking them not for subsistence but for generation of income.”

Seed growers who sell their products to fellow farmers and those involved in agricultural processing such as converting jatropha plants into bio-diesel fuel or ethanol are examples of agri-business activities, which farmers may use to increase productivity of their land, she said.

Solidarity with Aquino

Mrs. Arroyo said extending the program anew is one way of showing solidarity with former President Aquino in liberating farmer beneficiaries from poverty.

The President also sent a strong signal to all stakeholders of the CARP that she really means business when she distributed 10,853 hectares of agricultural lands to agrarian reform beneficiaries.

She led the switching on of a man-sized board bearing the sites of various rural infrastructure projects, which include 18 farm-to-market roads and 10 communal irrigation systems, among others.

These projects will be implemented in Aurora, Bataan, Bulacan, Nueva Ecija, Pampanga, Tarlac, and Zambales.

Anastacio Isidro, 81, the second farmer here to receive a land title from Marcos, commented that President Arroyo’s program is mere politics.

He said most politicians today are scions of landlords in the past.

However, Isidro said that land reform in the time of the elder Macapagal was more meaningful, noting that farming then was also easier.

He said that the government cannot blame local farmers for selling their land after receiving the title as they can hardly make their land productive.

Isidro said that the riceland awarded to him by Marcos was later sold to the government as it was sliced by a pass road project in this town.

“I was not able to till my land because they built a road there, burying my field. It’s good that they paid us, and I was able to send my children to school,” he said in Filipino.

Identify CARP beneficiaries

Meanwhile, Liza Sacdalan, a farmer leader here, advised the government to identify the beneficiaries of land reform and strictly monitor them.

She said land reform is fast becoming counter productive as farmers immediately sell their farms instead of making it agriculturally productive.

“The land is wasted because once farmers get their land titles, the beneficiaries sell their land right away,” she said.

She added that for farmers to be productive today, the government should give full support to organic farming.

Bishops grateful

Bishops said they are grateful for the passage of the CARPER Law, as this is a victory for the landless farmers.

“Now that the CARPER has been signed into law, the next step is to ensure that it is implemented properly,” leaders of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said.

CBCP president Jaro, Iloilo Archbishop Angel Lagdameo told the Church-run Radio Veritas in an interview said that he commended the signing of the CARPER Law by President Arroyo.

“Thank God, the CARP Extension plus Reform is approved and signed. Its implementation must be guarded in favor of the farmers. The money allotted for it must be used with accountability and justice. It (should bring about a) better quality of life for the rural poor,” said Lagdameo.

In a separate interview, Basilan Bishop Martin Jumoad regarded the CARPER as a landmark law and a victory for the farmers.

“This would revive the hope among the farmers that they would own the land that they till and that it would bring about the eradication of violence against farmers.”

“I hope the implementers will really work hard to implement the law for all. There should be no sacred cows.”

He is worried that powerful politicians might wield their influence so their land property would not be covered under the CARPER Law.

The Mindanao-based prelate said that he would be one of those who would closely monitor the implementation of the law.

“What happened to CARP should not happen again, wherein during the two decades that it was implemented, there were no support services and that is why it was not successful.”

CBCP-Public Affairs Committee (PAC) chairman Kalookan Bishop Deogracias Iniguez said he is hoping that with the signing of the new law, the lives of the farmers and poor people would be uplifted. –-Paolo Romero and Dino Balabo (The Philippine Star) with Evelyn Macairan