Palm Oil Expansion in Philippines of Serious Concern

In June, the Philippine Department of Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Ramon Paje announced the country intends to convert eight million hectares of land to oil palm cultivation in Palawan, Philippines.

Deforestation for a palm oil plantation in Sumatra, Indonesia. Such practices are starting up in Palawan. Photo by Rhett A. Butler.

In June, the Philippine Department of Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Ramon Paje announced the country intends to convert eight million hectares of land to oil palm cultivation in Palawan, Philippines. The announcement has proved controversial. In the first week of November, an anti-oil palm expansion group sent a copy of their petition to the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of the Indigenous People for the United Nations Commission on Human Rights hoping to elevate their concerns over land-grabbing issues faced by tribes in Palawan, Philippines.

Marivic Bero, secretary-general of the Coalition Against Land Grabbing (CALG) said in a statement during the Yangon Workshop on Human Rights and Agribusiness in Myanmar, that “our hope is that, through the Special Rapporteur, the complains [sic] of our Palawan farmers and IP [indigenous people] brothers will be brought directly to the higher levels of our national government, as well as to selected agribusiness corporations.”