Filipino Women in the Rice Industry : A Case Study

Rice industry in Philippines: An Overview

As in most of Asia, rice in the Philippines is one of the staple food items. Therefore food security and food sovereignty policies quite naturally revolve around rice self-sufficiency. This is quite justified on the grounds rice accounts for 19% of total household spending on food in 2000. Moreover, rice contributes as much 65% and 45% of the population’s caloric and protein intake respectively.

In terms of livelihoods as well, paddy production is an important source of generating economic activity in rural areas. It accounts for 17% of the country’s agricultural output from 2001-2005, and directly employs at least 4 million rice farmers. Of the 6 million women engaged in agriculture, 37.36%, or more than one third, are into rice farming.

Rice farming is found in all regions of the country. In fact, almost 40% of the country’s total agricultural lands are planted to rice. The key rice producing regions are Central Luzon, (Autonomous Region of Mindanao) ARRM and Cagayan Valley.

Impact of trade liberalization policies on rice farming

Despite the fact that rice occupies the topmost position in terms of the Philippine’s commodity production, yet it has to import rice every year from other nations. This condition puts a solid question mark on the rice self-sufficiency of the country.

Given the fact that Philippines is a member country of the WTO, it is obliged to the phenomenon of opening of the local market to foreign goods and services through the reduction or elimination of tariffs and trade barriers. Till a few years back, rice industry in the Philippines was protected but in the recent past, the country is facing tremendous pressure with respect to liberalizing the rice industry.

The Philippines maintains a quantitative restriction (QR) on rice importation. The rice QR is the only import restriction measure under the Magna Carta of Small Farmers (Republic Act 7607 of 1992), which was not converted into tariffs after the latter faced amendment by the agricultural Tariffication Act (Republic Act 8178 of 1996). The country was able to secure an exemption from liberalization for the rice industry under Annex 5 f the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA). This exemption allowed the country to maintain import restrictions on the commodity even as it tariffied all other agricultural products in keeping with its liberalization commitment under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT).

During the past years, there have been pressures to liberalize the rice industry. The expiration of the exemption from tariffication under Annex 5 by 2004 raised questions on whether or not the Philippines should continue to maintain quantitative restrictions on rice importation. Also, international financing institutions like the Asian Development Bank (ADB) through its Grains Sector Development Program have made rice tariffication as conditionality for the release of loans.

Unfortunately, regional trade agreements such as the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Free Trade Area – Common Effective Preferential Treatment (AFTA-CEPT) and the ASEAN-China Free Trade Area have laid down the groundwork for the liberalization of rice markets in the region. Though rice is generally treated as a highly sensitive product among ASEAN members, the trade agreements nevertheless provided for some opening up of the country’s domestic rice market to other rice exporting countries in the region. Under the AFTA-CEPT, the Philippines eventually removed rice import restrictions and adopted a 50% tariff on imports from ASEAN members in 2003. This runs counter to its official position in the WTO where the extension of rice QR was renegotiated.

As a result the Philippines now imports rice from Thailand, Vietnam, China and the US. The US imports mainly come as food aid (PL 480) programs.

Role of women in the rice value chain:

Filipino women play a very important role in the rice industry. They are active players and contributors especially in some phases of the rice value chain. There are 5 main segments this chain. These are

The results of the Philippine Peasant Institute (PPI) survey further show that women are engaged in almost all areas of rice production. Women participation is particularly high in activities such as planting, weeding, input and fertilizer application, drying and sacking among others.

Apart from actively participating in actual rice production, women are primarily responsible for activities such as food preparation, and bringing this to the rice field during mealtime. They are also highly involved in tasks such as the hiring of workers and the storing of seeds for future planting.

The PPI study pointed out that the women’s scope of influence, contrary to common belief, extends beyond household maintenance to cover decisions relating to budget allocation for farm input expenses and productive activities.

Access to inputs and production:

Women play a very important role in accessing inputs to rice production. A survey of women engaged in rice farming conducted by the PPI showed that almost 70% of the women are directly involved in capital procurement. The survey also showed that in the rice sector, 94% of the women have borrowed money, mainly from informal moneylenders, small convenience or sari-sari stores, cooperatives, relatives and other sources to finance rice farming and to augment household expenses. Women borrow money more than men because they are the ones directly managing household and production expenses, and are thus under greater pressure to bridge resource gaps.

Also access to formal credit is low for women as compared to the men. Under such situations women often end up in borrowing from private moneylenders, who are also traders in the rice market. This limits their capabilities of bargaining and acts as a constraint for women producers from getting better prices.

Access to land:

Women farmers engaged in rice production are small-owner cultivators, tenants or farm-workers. Small-owner cultivators own their land by virtue of emancipation patents issued through land reform. However, most of the land titles of land owning households are in the name of male spouses, despite the fact that women play an important role in the production segment of the rice value chain. Based on data from the Department of Agrarian Reform, female agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) account for 22% of the total number of beneficiaries in 2002. However, women’s involvement in agrarian related projects is greater compared to men, although they are not as active at the organizational level, especially in leadership positions.

Others:

So far as access to methods of irrigation by women is concerned, in 2000, only 2.7 million hectares of the total 4 million hectares of land devoted to rice were irrigated. The balance (1.3 million hectares) remained rain-fed. 60% of the irrigated areas are in Luzon, 26% are in Mindanao and 16% are in the Visayas. Available information on irrigation does not include gender-disaggregated data on the beneficiaries of irrigation services and facilities.

In terms of government support, most beneficiaries of government support are men farmers. On average, women farmers account for less than one-third of the total beneficiaries of government programs. The only exemption is in the case of credit delivery under the Agricultural Credit Policy Council where women account for almost half of the total number-beneficiaries.

Problems arising due to influx of rice imports

Farmers groups have raised issues regarding the volume and timing of importation. In particular, they assert that government is inclined to import more than the forecasted shortage. They also cite many cases when government imports coincide with the harvest season. Both these situations have the effect of dampening prices for domestically produced rice, and lower income for small men and women rice farmers in the rice value chain.

Apart from legal imports, there are also incidences of rice smuggling from Thailand, China and Vietnam into Philippines. The illegal transportations of rice do not have any proper data source and therefore the extent remains unknown.

The influx of smuggled rice in the market also exerts a downward pressure on retail and farm-gate prices. Such influxes have adversely affected mostly the small farmers majority of those being the women farmers.

The case study points to the fact that women constitute an integral part of the rice industry in Philippines. They are engaged in every aspect of paddy cultivation, harvesting, threshing, and milling etc. up to the marketing of rice. However, women are concentrated in specific areas.

Therefore, as concluding remarks, it can be pointed out that policies on the rice industry, including those prescribed by international and regional trade agreements, that tend to favor corporate interests, have implications to the women’s productive roles and incomes.

The fact that the rice sector is crucial to the Philippines food security and rural development stresses on the important role played by the rural women in the agricultural sector as well as in the whole economy. It also emphasizes the need to ensure that policies for the rice industry must equally consider the rights, welfare, agenda and interests of the women farmers engaged in the production and cultivation of paddy.

[Excerpted and compiled from ‘A Row to Hoe: The Gender Impacts of Trade Liberalization on our Food System, Agricultural Markets and Women’s Human Rights’, Alexandra Spieldoch, IATP-IGTN, 2007 and ‘Gender and Rice: The Case of Philippines’, Jessica Reyes-Cantos and Riza Bernabe, IGTN, 2006]