Rebranding the chainsaw after Yolanda

Just as in Hollywood movies, the chainsaw has been regarded in the past as a weapon for destruction of the Philippine environment.  The Western Visayas region can well attest to the destructive power of the chainsaw when, on the morning of November 5, 1991, Typhoon Uring (Thelma) caused a massive flood bringing down chopped logs from the Leyte Mountains and claiming  almost 8000 lives.

Illegal logging and kaingin (slash and burn method of clearing forests) were tagged as the culprits. The handy simple equipment – the chainsaw – became a symbol of the blatant disregard and greed which had been a factor in the disaster, with environmental groups awarding chainsaw replicas to shame notorious firms behind big logging operations in the country.

Two decades later, Yolanda (Haiyan) changed the image of chainsaw in Ormoc City and in other typhoon-affected communities.  At a recent coconut forum organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization and the Philippine Coconut Authority in Baybay, Leyte, coconut farmers echoed the need for more chainsaws before any successful recovery can take place.

“Three month since Yolanda, I still see hectares of coconut farms with felled trees and debris. It’s the same situation I saw, when I left on Christmas eve last year”, said Romulo Tapayan, a farmer leader of a national federation of coconut farmers who helped organized meetings with coconut stakeholders on their recovery efforts in December last year.

“Una, kailangan maayos ang bahay namin at kailangan ang chainsaw para putulin ang natumbang niyog at gawin itong pampalit sa nasirang poste,” Vilma Remedia, a coconut farmer-leader from KAANIB, Casigara, Leyte said. (First, our houses should be fixed and for that we need chainsaws to cut and slice the felled trees and replace damaged posts.”

Romano Solano, another coconut farmer leader representing coconut and banana agrarian reform beneficiaries also made the same point “We are appealing for the immediate clearing of the areas so that we can start planting and recovery.”

New image

The Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) said that 340 chainsaws are currently being deployed through local government units. This is in addition to other chainsaws that have been donated to farming groups by different humanitarian organizations like Oxfam.  Even so, farmers’ leaders still maintain that there aren’t enough chainsaws to go around.   

Operating chainsaws also require technical skills and not everybody knows how to operate one. Provision of fuel and accessibility of spare parts are also a challenge. So too is regulating the use of chainsaws to ensure that they will not be used for illegal logging operations.    

 “We work with local community co-operatives or associations, rather than individuals, and provide training. The processed timber is provided at subsidized costs and profits are ploughed back into the sawmill project.   It’s self-sustaining. And the whole community, even non-members, can benefit,” Oxfam’s emergency food security and vulnerable livelihoods officer Zenia Leysa said.

The problem of clearing fallen coconut trees is more complicated for tenants and lease-holders who need to locate their landowners after Yolanda. They need to get permissions from the landowners and agree on a mutually-beneficial sharing scheme for the timber. 

Coconut farmers are clear on what needs to be done for them to recover. “After the clearing of the debris, we need seedlings – coconuts, fruits, banana and root crops,” Remedia said. Romano Salono added how this needs to start quickly, as it is likely that food relief operations will soon end.

Farmers should also study other ways to help them earn extra income, such as raising poultry and livestock, he said, as it will still be many years before coconut trees matured and become economically productive.

The coconut industry lives

Despite incurring massive losses after Yolanda, coconut farmers and representatives from the local coconut industry are adamant that their industry was still economically viable. “The coconut industry here is not dead…We will recover,” Emmanuel Licup , CEO of SC Global, one of the four coconut oil mills in Leyte said, after disclosing that the plant has resumed its operations.

“What is also needed is for the government to also help us repair our facilities,” a representative from a co-operative which extracts coconut fibers for processing into twine agreed.  Many plants engage women to twine the fibers into coir.

Other export crops, banana and abaca (Musa textilis) thrive in the coconut farms and they, too, suffered heavy losses. Export markets and companies sourcing their raw materials from these local companies are in the best position to help their business partners by sharing the cost of the repair, and to assist the coconut farmers on their recovery efforts, the meeting heard.  

Yet, all long-term recovery and rehabilitation efforts, be it by farmers or by industry, have failed to make much headway because the first crucial step, the clearing of debris, is being hampered by a lack of chainsaws. 

With this need, the chainsaw has emerged with a reinvented image – seen no longer as a symbol of destruction but as a key ally in the reconstruction of coconut farming communities in Yolanda-affected areas. – Rappler.com

Golda Hilario is Oxfam in the Philippines Economic Justice Policy and Research Officer. She has had over 10 years of experience in research and policy analysis in the areas of sustainable agriculture and trade.