The latest episode in the ongoing saga featuring Gina Lopez saw opposing groups mobilize ahead of her confirmation as Department of Environment and Natural Resources secretary. One group, the familiar anti-mining militants, showed up in front of the Senate, shouting the usual slogans and waving the usual placards and streamers. The other, meanwhile, witnessed thousands of mining stakeholders from as far away as Mindanao, in a rare show of force calling against Lopez’s confirmation.
The composition of the two groups already reveal so much about the character of this ongoing debate. The pro-Lopez side is composed of various left-leaning propagandists obviously performing to drum up publicity for the sake of the cameras. In clear contrast, participants in the Reject Gina Lopez demonstrations were people coming from as far as Mindanao, whose everyday life was directly compromised by the slew of mining closures that Lopez had ordered.
This brand of polarizing debate echoes in all forms of media, with the anti-mining side exploiting the same drama and vitriolic refrains, which, to many experts, preclude the discussion of the real issues.
The bandied-about line on mining’s supposedly miniscule contribution to the country’s Gross Domestic Product, while dramatic for sound bites, is misleading at best. The figure only represents up to the beneficiation stage of operation, with the processing of minerals like copper, gold, nickel, iron ore, cement, silica, and others are attributed to manufacturing. Other allied industries, like construction, and service industries, like logistics, shipping, transportation, communications, and small businesses all over mining communities are often excluded in the accounting of the sector’s numerical contribution in terms of GDP.
For the macro-economy, a total of P10 billion in tax revenues came from mining in 2015. Nearly half of this amount or P4.6 billion comes from mining companies that are now facing closure or suspension. This does not include the support services and other small industries in mining sites, such as contractors and small businesses, all of which pay taxes. According to the World Bank, these enterprises are particularly important because they contribute the most to rural development in far-flung areas ignored by the conventional economy.
These figures only account for taxes and revenues. In terms of jobs both direct and indirect, which Lopez belittles as easily replaceable, nearly 200,000 Filipinos are bound to suffer. If we assume that these workers feed an average of six family members, this translates to some 1.2-million Filipino lives summarily compromised.
These families likewise benefit from the massive investment in human capital and community services and infrastructure that mining companies are required by law to expend. Generations of children have gone to and finished school via scholarships in technical fields, while thousands of elementary and high school pupils enjoy free tuition in mining communities and nearby areas. Some P1 billion is allotted annually on average into these projects. All in all, up to P28 billion in these funds are in danger of being compromised by the closure orders.
There is also a protectionist angle that anti-mining advocates echo: That the revenues of big mining companies are all repatriated to foreign countries. This is obviously rooted in a leftists’ aversion to foreign ownership, dating back decades to the 1960s. A simple check will again reveal this to be unfounded. The two FTAAs that allow foreign ownership, Oceana Gold and Tampakan, has just started operating and have not started at all, respectively. The rest are all Filipino firms.
Beyond these, in the long term, investments in mining, which could reach the trillion-peso mark, could easily aid the Duterte administration’s ambitious industrialization and manufacturing resurgence programs. A roadmap for the mining sector has been development, geared to maximize its contribution toward spurring productivity en route to inclusive growth. Instead, the unstable investment environment deters any sensible long-term prospect for the potentially rich industry.
These are the complex realities that should take centerstage in any principled debate about a matter as complex as mining and the environment. On one hand, anti-mining propagandists can be expected to deliberately misguide the public through scare tactics carefully veiled in environmental and social crusade. Glaringly missing is the science, the economics, the truth behind the blitz.
Our policy leaders and specially the powerful members of the Commission on Appointments should sift through the propaganda and ground the discussion. If the government gives in to the propaganda, will the environment win, then? Not really, going by how the same outcry omits thousands of illegal small scale mining operations and its attendant issues, from environmental degradation to child labor and smuggling. What, then, is their real agenda? Signs tell us that their enemy seems to be development itself with the strategic goal of destabilizing the system. So much for being “progressive.”