Pinoy Weekly - ‘DOLE proposals vs child labor in palm oil plantations, weaker than palliatives’

Posted: 14 Aug 2013 02:32 AM PDT

“Children of the Sunshine Industry” a study of CTHUR released last October 2012.

The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), together with the company Filipinas Palm Oil Plantation, Inc. (FPPI) in Agusan del Sur, has developed an Anti-Child Labor Program in response to a study by a labor advocacy group that pointed out, among others, that 24 percent of workers employed in palm oil plantations are minors.

But the program has been criticized by the same labor advocacy group, Center for Trade Union and Human Rights (CTUHR), saying the proposals adopted by DOLE and FPPI are “weak responses” and are “far weaker than palliatives.”

CTUHR said, in a statement, that the move of the management and government agencies was a positive result of their own study exposing the plantation of employing workers below 18 years old. But the group criticized the proposals made by DOLE’s Technical Working Group that drafted the program.

“The recommendations are far weaker than palliatives because they fail to address the root causes of child labor like below minimum wage rates, long-term contractualization, among others,” Daisy Arago,executive director of CTUHR said.

Last October 2012, CTUHR released their study entitled “Children of the Sunshine Industry Child Labor and Workers’ Situation in Oil Palm Plantations in Caraga”. The study revealed that child workers are engaged in work in the same manner as their adult counterparts.


Strenuous work for children
The most strenuous work done by minors in palm oil plantations is hauling and harvesting. “Children have to raise a steel rod that reaches the canopy of the palm fruit (for harvesters) or they have to carry at least a 15-kg palm fruit bunch (for haulers) and load it to the truck for transport,” the report said.

Aside from heavy work, child workers are paid less and working for 8 to 12 hours daily. Just like other workers, they too are casual workers, said Arago.

“A hauler, for instance, is only paid PhP3 for every fruit bunch he is able to haul which means that he has to haul at least 50 fruit bunches a day to earn at least P150. Only 10 percent of the surveyed child workers earn the minimum wage while the remaining 4% earn above the minimum wage,” stated in the report. The report also noted that 74 percent of children between 5-17 years old are attending school while 71 percent of the same age bracket dropped out and finished only grade 5.

Worst of all, child workers are subjected to occupational hazards. They showed signs of fatigue and minor injuries, while some complained of having burns, sprains, fractures, eye problems, breathing problems among others.
In the report, the group noted that high incidence of poverty in the province, lack of employment oppurtunies, measly wages and contratual work are the contributing factors to child labor in the plantation.

According to CTUHR, the TWG recently adopted a two-course of action as part of the Anti-Child Labor Program adopted in FPPI. These are: 1) prohibiting and monitoring cases of child labor in FPPI; and 2) provision of school buses for the children living inside the plantation.


Child labor will continue
But for the CTUHR, these recommendations will not stop child labor. The group said it will rather push children to find work outside the plantation to augment their family needs.
“Merely prohibiting or monitoring child labor in FPPI is (useless) if issues of contractual work and depressed wages are not substantially addressed. This line of thinking only puts the blame back on the parents, the workers themselves, rather than to the exploitative conditions perpetuated by the FPPI management that pushes young family members to work in the plantation to increase family income,” Arago added.

CTHUR revealed in their report that 24% of workers in palm oil plantations in Agusan del Sur are children aged 5 to 17 years. (CTUHR photo)

Arago also criticized the proposal to provide school buses, saying such action is “useless if the workers cannot even afford to send their children to school since their wages are insufficient for their food expenses.”

CTUHR also denounced FPPI management’s move to stop hiring contractual workers. The group said the move is deceitful.

“Instead of reinstating the 268 contractual workers as regular employees, they used the workers’ complaint against long-term contractualization to not hire these workers back. And although FPPI is no longer hiring casual workers directly, they are using the ‘cabo’ system wherein regular workers hire casual workers,” stated Arago.

In November 2012, nearly 300 contractual workers were unjustly dismissed by FPPI after the DOLE held an ocular inspection of the company’s compliance to labor standards. The said inspection was prompted by the local union complaint about numerous cases of underpayment of wages, long-term casualization and absence of several benefits. Since November 2011, five casual workers have died due to electrocution while harvesting palm fruit bunches.

The latest victim was Cesar Muanag, who died on March 23, 2013–a day after getting electrocuted.


Passing on responsibility
Arago also expressed anger at the result of the tripartite discussion that emphasized the workers role in increasing the plantation’s productivity rather than addressing labor issues.

“The way FPPI and DOLE managed to make it appear that child labor and casual work is stopped and then pass on the responsibility to increase productivity to the workers is brazenly sly,” Arago added.
The group reiterated that their report’s recommendation to end child labor in FPPI and other palm oil plantations in Agusan de Sur, is as follows: 1) implement the minimum wage rates for all employees; 2) regularize all casual workers who have worked in the FPPI for more than a year; and 3) provide access to employment, livelihood and other services to families living inside the palm oil plantations.

FPPI is owned by a Filipino-Malaysian consortium that covers more than 8,000 hectares of the towns of Trento and Mati in Agusan del Sur. Reports said that FPPI is planning to add 2,000 hectares in Davao del Norte for its palm oil operations.

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