NFSP program for sugar workers set

The National Federation of Sugarcane Planters (NFSP) is set to implement starting this year a five-year program for the development and improvement of the socio-economic well-being of workers in the sugar industry.

NFSP launched the initial skills training component of this long term program in 1999 where some 200 sugar workers and their dependents completed their studies in the electrical trade, welding and steel fabrication and auto-diesel courses at the Technological University of the Philippines-Visayas in the City of Talisay, Negros Occidental.

The graduation exercises was held at the City of Talisay Coliseum last November with no less than the Hon. Josefino T. Torres, executive director of the Bureau of Rural Workers Office of the Department of Labor and Employment was the guest speaker.

The program is NFSP's response to the many challenges of the New Millennium affecting the industry's labor sector in line with the pro-poor program of President Estrada, NFSP executive vice president Enrique D. Rojas said.

Incorporated in 1930, NFSP has the distinction of being the first and oldest sugar federation in the Philippines. Since its organization 70 years ago, the social amelioration of sugar workers has been consistently among its priorities in the pursuit of its corporate goals, Rojas said. In fact, former Bacolod congressman and NFSP president Romeo G. Guanzon has authored RA 6982, otherwise known as the Social Amelioration Act for sugar workers, he said.

According toRojas, the program will be joint undertaking of NFSP and the Bureau of Rural Workers (BRW) of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE). It will be primarily funded from sugar liens collected by the DOLE for socio-economic projects for the amelioration of sugar workers under Section 10(b) of RA 6982.

NFSP's five-year program was prepared by the Socioeconomic Research Inc. (SRI), a management consulting firm based in Manila whose services were engaged by NFSP for the purpose, Rojas further said.

The program was formulated based on the results of a nationwide survey conducted by SRI of the living and working conditions of sugar workers, he said.

According to the NFSP executive vice president, the survey revealed that most sugar workers have no access to health care. And while some planters' associations operate a hospital, the facilities are far from adequate to meet the growing needs of sugar workers and their dependents.

Most of their children, he said, are enrolled in primary and secondary schools but become dropouts before they reach fourth year for lack of educational financial aid.

Among the biggest problem, he said, is that alternative livelihood activities for sugar workers are difficult to find during off-milling season. They have no alternative sources of income. They merely rely on the landowners for their basic needs. This compound the financial problems of sugarcane planters especially during the prevailing sugar crisis.

This is the reason why NFSP has prioritized Health Care, Educational Aid, Vocational and Technical Short Courses and Livelihood Projects in its action plan, Rojas explained.

NFSP's long-range program is designed to contribute to the socio-economic upliftment of sugar workers and their dependents by giving them opportunities to have access to education, skills training, preventive health care and cash relief assistance for livestock production and other small-scale economic enterprises, Rojas said.

NFSP is the umbrella organization of 35 sugarcane planters associations spread out over Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. And the target beneficiaries of the program are the sugar workers and their dependents employed by the planters/members of the planters' associations affiliated with NFSP, he said.