Farmers seek CBCP help on coco levy funds

SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga , Philippines   â€“ The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) and the Coco Levy Funds Ibalik sa Amin (CLAIM) asked yesterday the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) to support the demand of millions of coconut farmers to get their share of the P70-billion coco levy funds in the form of “social benefits.”

The KMP sent the appeal to some 90 bishops gathered in a plenary assembly that ends today at the Pope Pius XII Catholic Center in Manila.

The KMP and CLAIM submitted to the CBCP National Secretariat for Social Action the “Coconut Farmers’ Proposal for the Disposition of the Coco Levy Funds.”

“We expect that the proposal of small coconut farmers for the cash distribution of the coco levy funds will be tackled by the CBCP permanent council,” said KMP deputy secretary-general Willy Marbella.

Marbella, also CLAIM national coordinator, hopes that the bishops would support their proposal.

“It has been more than 40 years since the coco levy funds were forcibly exacted from small coconut farmers and until now, no single genuine small coconut farmer has benefited from their money,” said Marbella, a coconut farmer from Bicol.

He also expressed hope that the bishops would add their voice in the growing clamor for the return of the coco levy funds to their real and legitimate owners and against the plan of President Aquino’s administration to use the billions of small coconut farmers’ money for the graft-ridden conditional cash transfer program.

The CLAIM proposal submitted to the bishops also said that cronies have plundered the coco levy funds since the Marcos dictatorship.

The group cited Aquino’s uncle businessman Eduardo Cojuangco Jr. whom it accused of controlling and monopolizing the coconut industry to expand his business empire.

CLAIM said the fund has already been “freed up from litigation by virtue of the Supreme Court decision that such funds are public, hence should be utilized first and foremost for the benefit of all coconut farmers especially the small coconut farmers.”

The KMP and CLAIM seek to establish a Small Coconut Farmers’ Council (SCFC) to directly manage and administer the recovered coco levy and to create a “Coconut Farmers’ Fund” to comprise the total amount of the coco levy that formed part of the various funds created that included the Coconut Investment Fund, the Coconut Consumers’ Stabilization Fund, Coconut Industry Development Fund, the Coconut Industry Investment Fund, the Coconut Industry Stabilization Fund, and the Coconut Reserve Fund.

Under the CLAIM proposal, small coconut farmers should be the primary beneficiaries of the fund in the form of cash and other social benefits including but not limited to pension benefits, medical and hospitalization benefits, maternity benefits, educational assistance including scholarships.

The proposal also wants the coco levy funds to “finance socio-economic programs that include livelihood projects, loan facilities, small and medium-scale coconut enterprises, marketing, etc., for small coconut farmers through their recognized organizations/cooperatives.”