Coffee Plantation Pushes T?bolis to the Fringe
What was once a farming village of indigenous peoples is now a vast coffee plantation that straddles six towns in three provinces. The plantation prevents the T?boli villagers from expanding their own farmland.
By Keith Bacongco
LAKE SEBU, South Cotabato — Nestled on top of the rugged mountains of Daguma Mountain Range, sitio Datal Bonlangon of barangay Ned in Lake Sebu, South Cotabato, is a home to T?boli villagers who have been robbed of their rights to their ancestral land and deprived of livelihood.
What was once a farming village of indigenous peoples is now a vast coffee plantation that straddles six towns in three provinces. The plantation prevents the T?boli villagers from expanding their own farmland.
In 1991, the Department of Environment Natural Resources (DENR) issued an Industrial Tree Plantation License Agreement (ITPLA) to Silvicultural Industries Inc. (SII) but a year later it was converted into Industrial Forest Plantation Management Agreement (IFMA). The agreement, which will expire on December 2016, covers 11,862 hectares.