Daughter of the land

MANILA, Philippines - I am already in my 60’s and I’m proud to say that more than half my life has been spent on the struggle for agrarian reform and women’s rights. But my relationship to the farm is even longer than that. I was my father’s constant companion on the farm for as long as I can remember. He would drag me from my sleep, playtime, or whatever I was doing; we would walk for 30 minutes to our farm. He would ask me to pull out weeds with roots bigger than my nine-year-old hands.

He would give me instructions on what to do when planting and maintaining rice, corn, vegetables like eggplant, ampalaya and tomatoes and root crops like turnips,” Trinidad Domingo or Ka Trining, a rice farmer in Nueva Ecija, recalls. 

She continues, “Maybe my father thinks I’m a boy. He would tell me which of the produce can be good seeds and which can be animal feeds. One time, my father forbade me to play because I still needed to work on several lipya (rows) of singkamas (turnip). I grudgingly took the bag of seeds but I was so angry I poked at the soil empty handed – I was leaving empty holes. It was my first and last act of defiance to my father. He died when I was 16 years old.”

Thereafter, Ka Trining continued working on the two-hectare farm, with some help from her siblings. Though she was the sixth in the brood of 11, she was the one who developed that deep bond with the land.

She had to stop schooling. “I would cry every time I saw my classmates on their way to school. I knew that I was a better student than some of my classmates. But my mother said that I’m the only one who knows farm work, so she did not agree to my uncle’s offer to support my education; I just poured out my tears in the fields.”

Ka Trining’s land was part of Hacienda de Leon in Nueva Ecija. She was only 20 years old when it was distributed under Presidential Decree 27 in 1972. She worked and managed the land and ensured payments for the land amortization. Ka Trining had to endure much pain for the land she loves. Her eldest brother decided that the land should be titled to their youngest brother who at that time was just 12 years old.

“It was not the first of my heartaches, Fernando (my elder brother) would pawn the land several times when all along I thought the amortizations I provided were being paid to the bank. Each time, I had to find money to buy back the land. The third time I redeemed the land for P350,000 and I had to spend all the money I saved from hog-raising,” she tearfully narrates.

In 1975, Ka Trining joined Katipunan ng Bagong Pilipina (KABAPA), a group of women farmers organized on the agrarian reform issue. There are various issues that peasant women face, mainly non-recognition of women’s unpaid labor and subordination in land ownership.

Ka Trining envisions her farm to be 100 percent organic. She believes in organic farming and attests that the harvest in organic farming is good and prices are competitive. However, she also believes that there is a need to spread the word about organic farming because not all farmers believe that it is economically viable.

“Organic farming will actually lessen the cost of production and at the same time yield safer food,” she relates.

The rural women’s coalition in Nueva Ecija is now embarking on organic rice production. This entails soil analysis, organic fertilizer production, climate analysis, and other capacity building sessions on social enterprise development.

Rural women like Ka Trining hope that this initiative will promote agriculture as a viable livelihood, especially among the youth. “Younger generations now do not even know what pinipig is. Hopefully, organic farming will make us more resilient to extreme weather conditions.”

Another issue that rural women face is the issue of land grabs. The Philippines lacks a National Land Use law that will solidify proper land use planning at the national level, thus even agricultural lands are prone to being sold to large investors and real estate developers.

“In Bulacan alone, our rice fields are being converted into subdivisions and memorial parks, and these are irrigated lands! What do you think would happen with increasing population and decreasing agricultural lands?” Ka Trining laments. 

“The country has enacted laws that are supposed to secure tenurial rights for small-scale farmers, fishers and indigenous peoples, however, the sorry state of asset reform law implementation continues to deny these sectors, especially women, their rights to land, municipal waters and ancestral domains,” says Kala Pulido-Constantino, Oxfam’s advocacy campaigns and communications coordinator.  

At present, Ka Trining devotes her time and energy to promoting women’s rights, and helps in the formation of women’s organizations. Even with these engagements, Ka Trining continues to till her rice farm and maintains her self-reliant household with various backyard vegetable crops and poultry (chickens and turkey) and fruit trees. She is still raising money to have the land transferred to her name.

“When I say that poverty should be addressed, I do not aspire for richness. For me, it only means one does not need to approach loan sharks, one can eat whenever he or she wants to, and one can live simply and peacefully. I do not want to get rich because then the fence has to be higher.”