Sugar Farmers, Workers Demand Audit of P206.4 Million Pest Control Funds

NEGROS OCCIDENTAL, Philippines – The Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) is now in “hot water” over the P206.4 million it reportedly spent to parry the red-striped soft scale insect (RSSI) infestation since last year. The National Congress of Unions in the Sugar Industry of the Philippines–Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (NACUSIP-TUCP), the country’s largest national federation of sugarcane plantation workers and sugar mill laborers, is demanding a full independent audit of the money spent to combat the pest. On June 23, at a high-end conference at the provincial capitol in Bacolod, SRA Administrator Pablo Luis Azcona told the media that SRA had already utilized P206.4 million since last year against RSSI. The agency’s mobilization of P206.4 million across the 2025 and 2026 fiscal cycles was aimed at combating RSSI infestation. The amount came from a combination of P177.5 million in SRA corporate funds and P28.9 million from the Sugarcane Industry Development Act–Quick Response Fund (SIDA–QRF). But Roland De la Cruz, national president of NACUSIP-TUCP, said small planters and workers have not received any concrete assistance, scientific intervention, or field‑level support. “Farmers themselves asserted that not a single peso of the supposed intervention has reached them. So where did the P206.4 million go?” De la Cruz said. Likewise, he noted that the agency has failed to present any public reports, program documentation, or independent evaluations to justify the multi-million-peso expenditure. “Farmers are suffering. Workers are losing jobs. Yet the SRA cannot even account where the P206.4 million went,” De la Cruz said. “Thus, we demand accountability, transparency.” Must Read Sugar farmers face new crisis as pest invades Negros Occidental plantations Elisama Gregorio, chairman of the NACUSIP-TUCP’s Agrarian Reform Beneficiaries Council, said the impact of this negligence will fall greatly on the agricultural workforce, who face immediate joblessness as standing canes dry up and die. “Farmers lose critical income every single harvest,” Gregorio said. On record, more than 80% of local sugar output in the province is courtesy of agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs)-turned-small sugar planters. They’ve outnumbered the Negros sugar barons in the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s. Most of them are NACUSIP-TUCP members. Around 60% of the Philippines’ annual sugar consumption is being supplied by Negros. De la Cruz thus considers SRA’s laxity to contain RSSI as catastrophic “institutional failure.” The Confederation of Sugar Producers Association Inc. (CONFED), one of the biggest sugar planters’ groups in the country, is also seeking clarity from SRA on how the P206.4 million was disbursed and spent. As the RSSI problem spreads farther, affecting thousands of hectares and threatening the livelihood of tens of thousands of workers, Negros Occidental 5th District Representative Dino Yulo also expressed apprehension that the current crisis would worsen soon. RSSI multiplies faster more than what others think, Yulo, a sugar planter himself, said. “With this, we need a permanent Task Force RSSI with the governor of the province as chairman.” The congressman, who also used to be one of the former top SRA executives, suggested that amid RSSI infestation, village kagawads (barangay councilors) in the province are needed to be tapped for validation of the damage in their respective barangays. Meanwhile, validated data of the SRA, as of June 26, show that at least 16,019 hectares of sugar farms on Negros Island have been affected by RSSI reinfestation. Of the total affected areas, 14,447.83 hectares are in Negros Occidental and 1,571.33 hectares in its twin province of Negros Oriental. – Rappler.com Pest infestation in Negros Island, Western Visayas surges 867% in 16 days