CORE GATEWAY COLLEGES, INC.
San Jose City, Nueva Ecija
BACHELOR OF ARTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE
1ST Semester 2022 – 2023
TERM PAPER
in
GE ELECT 1
ARIEL TAGADUAR CABUQUID
BAPS 1- NIGHT CLASS
TITLE
Case Study on the Impacts of Mining and Dams on the
Environment and Indigenous Peoples in Benguet, Cordillera, Philippines
I. INTRODUCTION
The Cordillera region in Northern Luzon, Philippines, is homeland to more than 1 million
indigenous peoples belonging to at least 8 distinct ethnic groups collectively known as
Igorots. Two of these ethnic groups, the Ibaloy and the Kankanaey, are found in the province
of Benguet, which occupies 265,538 hectares of the Cordillera region’s total land area of 1.8
million hectares. The Ibaloy people live in the southeastern portion, occupying 8 of the
province’s 13 towns. The Kankanaey, meanwhile dominate the northeast areas of Benguet.
Benguet’s fertile land along the rivers and gold ore in the mountains saw the emergence
of distinct villages engaged in various economic activities. Gold mining communities rose in
the gold-rich areas in Itogon, while gold-trading villages were established along strategic
mountain passes and trails. Rice-growing villages emerged in the river valleys. Swidden
farming combined with gold panning in the streams and rivers.
Land ownership among the Ibaloy and Kankanaey is traditionally recognized by prior
occupation, investment of labor and permanent improvements on the land, specifically
irrigation systems and retaining stonewalls of the ricefields. The community shares access
rights to the forests, rivers, and creeks, and the fruits of these lands and waters are open to
those who gathered them.
The combination of mines and dams in Benguet has had devastating impacts on the
environment and on the Kankanaey and Ibaloy people in the province. These impacts have
not only caused serious environmental destruction and suffering for the affected
communities, but have also violated the collective rights of the indigenous peoples. As
proven by the experience of the Benguet indigenous peoples, large-scale corporate mining
and dams destroy, pollute, disrupt agricultural economies, and displace indigenous peoples.
II. BODY
The province of Benguet has hosted 14 mining companies since corporate mining started
in 1903. Some of these mines have closed down while others have continued. Presently
operating in Benguet are two large mines using high technology for large-scale mineral
extraction. These are the Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company (operating for 70 years)
and the Philex Mining Corporation (operating since 1955). Benguet Corporation, the oldest
mining company in the country, abandoned its operations in 1997 after mining for almost a
century. The abandoned open pit mine site, underground tunnels, waste dump sites, mill,
diversion tunnels and tailings dams in Itogon still remain today. The company now has
ongoing contract mining arrangements with small scale miners. Itogon-Suyoc mines closed
down in 1997, but is now negotiating with foreign investors to reopen its mines. In addition,
new mining explorations and applications are now coming into other parts of Benguet with
renewed efforts by the government to invite foreign investments. These applications of
various kinds, numbering 138, are found in all 13 municipalities of the province covering
147,618.9 hectares or 55.7% of the province’s total land area. This figure is aside from the
area already covered by past and existing mines. Thus we have a situation where most of the
total land area of Benguet is covered by past, ongoing and future mining operations.
Accompanying mining operations is the construction of tailings dams needed to contain
the mine wastes. These tailings dams were built across the river beds in various parts of
Benguet. However, most tailings dams are not leak proof and have not been strong enough to
withstand torrential currents during the typhoon season, and the major earthquake that rocked
Northern Luzon in 1990. Through the years, tailings dams in Benguet have proved incapable
of containing the volume of tailings that came from the mills. Time and again, these tailings
have breached their dams. Benguet Corporation constructed 5 tailings dams. Lepanto has 5
tailings dams, 2 of which collapsed. Philex has 3 tailings dams, 2 of which collapsed in 1992
and 1994. In 2001, tailings breached another Philex dam. Itogon-Suyoc has 1 tailings dam
that collapsed in 1994. Thus we have a situation where burst, broken, weak and leaking
tailings dams dot the major river systems of the province – the Abra River, Agno River,
Antamok River and Bued River.
Corporate mining in Benguet is done by surface mining as well as underground tunneling
and block caving. Also significant are other surface excavations by the mining companies for
the installation of facilities, such as portals for deep mining, lumber yards, ore trains, mills,
tailings ponds, power houses, mine administration offices, and employee housing.
Abandoned mine sites like Benguet Corporation and Itogon-Suyoc Mines in Itogon have
long-term damaging impacts on rivers and their surrounding fields because of the build up of
acidic mine water. Acid mine drainage comes from both surface and underground mine
workings, waste rock, tailings piles and tailings ponds. Pollution of this kind can continue
long after a mine is closed or abandoned, and the water that leaches into the ecosystem is
frequently acidic, killing rivers and posing health risks to local communities.
Siltation of rivers is a serious problem in Benguet resulting from mining operations and
dam construction. The Ambuklao and Binga dams are stark examples of the detrimental
impacts of siltation and megadams on rivers. The steadily rising level of silt in the dam
reservoirs and along the Agno River upstream of the dams is covering a wider and wider area
around the dams and continues to destroy more and more rice fields. In the case of the
Ambuklao dam, the communities of Bangao and Balacbac were located far above the
predicted water level of the dam and 17 kilometers away from the predicted edge of the
reservoir. These two communities are now inundated because of the rising water level and
accumulation of silt upstream along the Agno River. Government authorities dismiss the
increasing siltation as a natural phenomenon. However, the Ibaloy people know that the dams
are the real culprit. The farmlands and communities were never affected by silt before the
dams were built despite storms and earthquakes. The dams blocked the free flow of water
and silt down to the lowlands. Silt deposits built up in the dam reservoir and blocked
oncoming silt that receded backwards upstream, swamping and inundating all farmlands and
communities within reach.
Women are primarily responsible for maintaining the health of the family and the
community. As such, women have to carry the burden of ill health arising from
environmental destruction and pollution due to mining operations. At the height of the open
pit mine and mill in Itogon, some pregnant women suffered miscarriage, while others
experienced diseases of the skin, respiratory tract and blood when exposed to toxic fumes
emanating from the mill. The drying up of natural water sources in another contributory
factor in the poor health and sanitation in the community.
Large-scale corporate mining and dams have dislocated the indigenous Kankanaey and
Ibaloy people from their ancestral lands and traditional livelihoods. Dams have caused the
loss of ancestral lands to inundation and siltation. Descendants of families displaced by dams
have been reduced to illegal occupants in the dam’s watershed areas or settlers in land owned
by others. Mining patents granted by the government to mining companies have denied
indigenous communities of their rights to ownership and control over their ancestral lands
and resources.
In terms of livelihood, mining concessions have taken over lands used by indigenous
peoples for their traditional livelihoods - ricefields, vegetable gardens, swiddens, hunting and
grazing livestock. Rice fields along riverbanks have been damaged by siltation. Garden
cultivators have lost their crops to surface subsidence. Traditional small scale miners have
lost their pocket mines and gold panning sites to the big mines and dams. Some communities
have lost entire mountainsides, burial sites and hunting grounds to ground collapse and deep
open pits. Traditional fishing is no longer possible in polluted rivers, replaced by commercial
fishponds in dam reservoirs.
An additional impact is the violation of the collective rights of the indigenous Kankanaey
and Ibaloy people of their collective rights to self-determination and cultural integrity as they
are displaced from the land and community that is the basis of their continued existence and
identity.
People’s alternatives to corporate mining and dams and indigenous systems of
sustainable resource utilization and management can be found in indigenous communities in
the Cordillera.
The Ibaloy and Kankanaey people of Benguet continue to practice traditional small-scale
mining till today. Traditional methods of pocket-mining and gold panning are crude but
environment-friendly and have been passed down through generations since the 16 th century.
Small-scale mining is a community affair and access to resources is defined by customary
laws, characterized by equitable sharing, cooperation and community solidarity. Men,
women, children and the elderly each have a role to play in the extraction and processing of
the ore. They extract only enough gold to meet their basic necessities and receive their share
of the gold based on an equitable sharing system. However, as communities are deprived of
their land and resources, these traditional small-scale mining methods and positive values are
now under threat of vanishing.
An alternative source of energy are microhydro dams as opposed to megadams. The
experience of the micro-hydro project (MHP) of the Chapyusen Mangum-uma Organization
(CMO) in the Cordillera proves the viability of a community-based and community-owned
power system to provide energy for lighting, rice milling, sugar pressing, blacksmithing and
carpentry. The MHP has built up the people’s capacity to develop their own local resources
while ensuring affordable access of poor households to electricity. It also became an
opportunity for the people to improve their organization by participating in all phases of
project implementation. The observance of ubfo or the traditional system of labor exchange
in community mobilization has had a positive outcome by restoring traditional cooperative
practices and the free utilization and exchange of individual skills towards a common
objective.
Another concern is the series of three mega hydroelectric dams built along the Agno
River - the Ambuklao, Binga and San Roque dams – that block the river flow to generate
electricity. The power generated by these dams has gone to supply the power needs of the
mining companies as well as the overall power demand of the Luzon Grid. However,
Ambuklao and Binga dams are dying and no longer fully operational, crippled by the
voluminous silt that has accumulated in the reservoirs, upstream and beyond. The San Roque
dam, which has the generating capacity of 345 megawatts, is now generating only 18
megawatts.
III. CONCLUSION
As a reader, it has a big impact to understand of what is happening in some places
knowing to be one of wonderful tourist spot in the Philippines is suffering from
environmental issues. In the case of Benguet where the indigenous people have already
suffered and will continue to suffer enormous damage to their lands and environment due to
the long-term impacts of mining and dams, proper and immediate compensation and
reparation should be provided to all affected people to include adequate monetary
compensation, sustainable livelihood, alternative land, employment and other sources of
regular income. A program for the restoration and rehabilitation of lands and waters
destroyed by mines and dams should be implemented.
Countries that are home to transnational companies should enact legislation that will
require those companies to operate using the same standards wherever they operate in the
world. Home countries whose nationals and corporate entities inflict damage in developing
countries, particularly on indigenous peoples, should impose some form of penalty on the
offending parties. Past experience has shown that no monetary compensation nor livelihood
project could replace or surpass the destroyed ancestral land and traditional livelihoods of
affected indigenous peoples. The solution to restoring the living quality and to stop the
permanent destruction of the environment is to stop destructive large-scale corporate mining
and decommission unviable tailings dams and megadams. Alternatives such as chemical-free
traditional small scale mining methods and community-based microhydros need to be
promoted and supported.
An international system should be created to allow complaints to be filed by affected
indigenous communities against companies, governments and financial institutions whose
development programs and interventions violate the rights of ownership and control by
indigenous peoples over their ancestral land, territories and resources and cause serious
destruction of the environment.
National legislation and policy on the liberalization of mining and the energy industry
need to be reviewed and revised as these have proven detrimental to indigenous peoples in
different parts of the country. A new mining policy should support the Filipino people’s
efforts towards nationalist industrialization and ensure the creation of jobs, food security, a
stable economy, mitigation of environmental degradation, and environmental rehabilitation.
The international community should develop minimum standards for the protection of the
environment and human rights that are binding on all countries and companies, based on the
highest existing standards, and with effective monitoring and sanctions imposed on the
offending parties, be it the national government, funding institutions, or the companies.
