FROM A sugar crisis to an oil crisis — call it a double whammy for struggling stakeholders in the sugar industry: planters (both big and small), millers, and farm workers.
Planters — especially smallholders and agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) — are already reeling from the all-time low millgate price of domestic sugar, averaging only P2,200 per 50-kilo bag since October last year. Now comes another blow: a global oil crisis.
The current fuel price surge could not have come at a worse time — right at the height of the milling season. Why?
Planters are now forced to spend significantly more on transportation, particularly fuel, to haul harvested sugarcane to the mills. With diesel prices reaching as high as P130 per liter in Negros Occidental, planters are truly feeling the full brunt of this twin crisis.
TRUCKING ALLOWANCE
David Andrew Sanson, planters’ representative to the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) Board, issued a public appeal on Wednesday, March 25 — not to the government, but to sugar centrals nationwide — to increase the trucking allowance granted to planters for milling.
He cited the spiraling fuel prices across the country, driven by ongoing conflict in the Middle East.
The problem, however, is that no law mandates sugar mills to provide trucking allowances to planters each milling season.
This “kindness” is extended voluntarily by mill management to help sustain local production and ensure a stable sugar supply.
The practice began in the 2000s, when sugar centrals phased out steam locomotive trains previously used to transport sugarcane.
At present, sugar mills in both northern and southern Negros Occidental provide trucking allowances ranging from P500 to P700 per ton, depending on the location of the farms.
I attempted to reach the management of two sugar centrals in the province, but both declined to comment on Sanson’s appeal.
Sanson warned that the ongoing fuel price surge threatens the stability of the entire sugar industry. He did not specify how much increase he is seeking, but emphasized: “An increase in trucking allowance may augment government relief efforts in addressing the sudden and steep surge of fuel prices due to ongoing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East.”
‘SUGAR BARON SYNDROME’
Reality shows that around 60% of the country’s sugar supply comes from Negros Occidental.
But the numbers also reveal a shift: around 140,000 — or roughly 80% to 90% — of sugar planters in the province are now agrarian reform beneficiaries engaged in small-scale farming.
In other words, the era of the so-called “sugar baron syndrome” in Negros Occidental is largely gone.
This is precisely why appeals like Sanson’s matter most to ARBs-turned-planters, who operate on tighter margins and are more vulnerable to rising costs.
ARTIFICIAL APPEAL
For Roland de la Cruz, president of the National Congress of Unions in the Sugar Industry in the Philippines – Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (NACUSIP-TUCP), the appeal for increased trucking allowance is artificial — if not futile.
It cannot meaningfully ease the current hardship faced by both planters and farm workers amid this twin crisis, de la Cruz said.
He added: “Such an appeal is quite off since sugar mills cannot be pressured. First, as I said, no law exists on trucking allowance. Second, sugar mills are also affected by the twin crisis.”
AWASH IN SUGAR
And here lies the uncomfortable truth about the sugar centrals.
De la Cruz revealed that many sugar mills in Negros Occidental have been struggling since the onset of the sugar crisis in October last year. Their warehouses are now filled with unsold domestic sugar, with few buyers due to a glut worsened by imported supply.
“Sanson, therefore, is just barking up the wrong tree,” de la Cruz said. “He should be proposing solutions that the government can implement to help planters and farm workers using public resources.”
REAL MISERY
The misery in the sugar industry is real — no filter, no exaggeration.
Simply put: when planters are whining, laborers are crying.
Why do I say this?
Because I grew up in a hacienda. I have seen — and lived — the reality that farm workers are now facing. As a teenager, I was once in their place. What they are experiencing today is not a myth — it is a painful, lived truth.
Even before the fuel crisis, the sugar downturn had already forced the suspension of some hacienda benefits. Even the mandated 13th month pay last December was affected.
So the question now is: how much worse will things get with the added burden of rising fuel costs?
De la Cruz is right — raising the alarm matters. But beyond that, SRA must act. Concrete assistance to planters must be pursued so that its ripple effects can reach farm workers.
SRA officials must think ahead — be more forward-looking in crafting solutions that can protect industry stakeholders in worst-case scenarios. Otherwise, the sugar industry may soon find itself in truly dire straits. And that would be a tragedy.
Really./PN
