Greens hit mining in Leyte rice fields
Extractions may have aggravated fish kill in Lake Bito

MacArthur, Leyte – Environmental groups raised alarm in the actual extraction of magnetite sand in an irrigated agricultural land about 300 meters away from Lake Bito in MacArthur, Leyte that may have aggravated the massive tilapia fish kill reported since last March 30.

Prof. Tabada of Visayas State Univeristy (VSU) said that the investigation conducted two years ago by Dr. Sergio Abit, Jr., a soil physicist, showed that the soil in the area very effectively allows water to pass through which means that continued excavation in the area would incessantly draw water from surface water sources such as the river, lake, or from the aquifer adjacent to the excavation. The water budget in a nearby lake could have been disturbed and endangered the year-round water supply in the lake.

According to an NMC official during a forum organized by the MacArthur Parish in November 2009, mining operations in the MacArthur rice paddies have an excavation depth of 10 to 15 meters. The field investigation projected that a 10-meter deep excavation could lead to drawdown from the observed WT depth of 0.24 m to as deep as 4.33 m from the surface. Hence, the presence of a nearby source of water, as a high as 44,603 cubic meter of water could be drawn into the 10m deep excavations for every hectare of area excavated.

Since 2010, the Social Action Center (SAC) of the Archdiocese of Palo and the National Irrigation Administration together with the Liwayway-Danao-Romualdez-Imelda-Maya Irrigators’ Association (LIDAROIMMA), the Visayas State University, and Alyansa Tigil Mina, have studied the impacts of the magnetite extraction in irrigated rice fields which included the loss of food security due to the conversion of rice fields to mining areas, competition for water utilization for household use, rice production, and magnetite extraction, damage to the NIA irrigation canal, among others.

According to Fr. Edwin Perito, SAC Director of Archdiocese of Palo, “Farmers had been distressed about the observed lowering water level in Lake Bito where they grow tilapia. They too are complaining about the strident noise of the mining operations.”

Perito said that there was no posting of “notice to mine”, people were taken by surprise when the Nicua Mining Corporation (NMC), now the Leyte Ironsnd Corporation, started its operations. NMC partnered with the big Chinese mining firm, Hengsheng Mining Corporation (HSMC) in a joint venture agreement to form the Leyte Ironsand Corporation. According to the company werbsite, LIC controls some 20,402 hectares of claims in Leyte, and the claims are all mineralized and cover a flat area of rice paddies and coconut plantations. The mining company transports the magnetite to China.

“The fish kill in Lake Bito may have been caused by lack of oxygen due to overcrowding and climate change, but magnetite mining, which sucks in water during extraction may have also contributed to this incident. This only shows that magnetite mining (in Leyte) is a clear threat to food security – wherein the tilapia fish industry in Lake Bito is at stake as well as rice production in the nearby area.,” said Jaybee Garganera, national coordinator of Alyansa Tigil Mina.

Garganera emphasized that magnetite mining in prime agricultural lands as well as in other areas such as in coastlines and offshore should be stopped considering the present threats of climate change and disasters.

Alyansa Tigil Mina is calling for the scrapping of the export-oriented Philippine Mining Act of 1995 and the enactment of the Philippine Mineral Resources Act of 2012 pending in congress.

“The Mining Act of 1995 is not clear on the protection of our agricultural areas – mining is being permitted adjacent to productive
farms or within rice fields and provides mining companies full right over our water resources,” claimed Garganera.

Alyansa Tigil Mina (ATM) is an alliance of mining-affected communities and their support groups of NGOs/POs and other civil society organizations who are opposing the aggressive promotion of large-scale mining in the Philippines.
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For more information:
Fr. Edwin Perito, Social Action Center Director, Archdiocese of Palo – 0920.967.6213 fr_edperito@yahoo.com
Prof. Tess Tabada, Director, Institute for Strategic Research and Development Studies, Visayas State University, Baybay City – 0933.443.4514 tesstabada@gmail.com
Jaybee Garganera, National Coordinator, Alyansa Tigil Mina – 0927.761.7602 <nc@alyansatigilmina.net>
Rodne Galicha, ATM SoS Officer for Visayas, Southern Tagalog/MiMaRoPa – 0905.285.0700 <sos@alyansatigilmina.net>

Press Release
April 12, 2012

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