New mining law addresses concerns of industry -- Tanada

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MANILA, July 12 (PNA) -- House Deputy Speaker and Quezon Rep. Lorenzo "Erin" Tanada III said Executive Order No. 79 recently signed by President Benigno S. Aquino III, coupled with a new mining law, will address the concerns of the mining industry. 
Tanada, author of House Bill No. 206 or the "Alternative Minerals Management Bill," said that EO 79 on mining has sparked renewed interest in the industry, and coupled with his proposed measure, "the concerns of the mining industry will be fully addressed." 
"If we pair EO 79 with the House Bill 206, we have the mining industry striking it's first gold," he stressed. 
Tanada said mining has been such a problematic industry for so long as it implicates issues in areas of governance, economic policy and environmental sustainability. 
Despite the implementation of the EO, he said it is still important to enact a new mining law "because many of the industry's problems can be traced back to the Mining Act of 1995 -- in the endless tax holidays of mining companies, in the lack of safeguards against irresponsible contractors, and the rent-seeking system of applying for mining permits." 
"The real problem of mining is the faulty premise in the Mining Act that the industry creates revenues and jobs -- which it doesn't -- and therefore its needs trump the interests of the community being mined," he noted. 
Tanada said mining "implicates issues in areas of governance, economic policy, and environmental sustainability. Naturally, the scope of a law to fix those glitches is broad and requires a lengthy process of consideration and debate." 
As such, he said it is still important to enact a new law on mining. 
Tanada cited figures from 2000-2009 which stated the industry's job-creation at a negligible 0.376 percent while its revenue effort averaged around half the national figure at 7.8 percent. 
Though effective, he averred that the EO is "not a substitute for a new mining law." 
"Because of the inherent limitation of an executive order, it can only prescribe rules for the execution of a law, it cannot change the law. What the Executive has given us here is a starting push, but it cannot do our work for us. Legislation is Congress' work and beyond even the President's powers," he noted. 

Tanada, however, stressed that the EO, though limited, "was a success of the campaign for mining reforms because it accepted the fundamental position of the advocates that some drastic change has to be made to the industry." (PNA) 

AQUINO SIGNS NEW MINING POLICY

 

But Palace to bare details of EO 79 only Monday

President  Benigno Aquino III has signed Executive Order No. 79 spelling out his administration’s policy on mining and will present it on Monday, a Palace source said Friday.

Presidential Communications Secretary Ramon Carandang would not confirm the signing of the much-awaited policy, but he acknowledged that the final draft that was submitted to the President underscored the need to increase the royalties and the taxes levied on mining firms.

Mr. Aquino earlier said that the taxes and royalties collected by the government from mining operations amounted to only 10 percent of their total revenue.

Carandang said the final draft of the order upheld the primacy of national laws over local laws and ordinances.

The primacy of national laws was earlier questioned by some 40 governors including Albay Gov. Joey Salceda, an ally of the President. They threatened to challenge the administration’s mining policy before the Supreme Court once it was signed by the President.

Salceda said the order would allow the national government to override the  anti- or pro-mining policies of local executives.

“There will always be people that would question the EO, but we believe it will be acceptable to most of the reasonable stakeholders,” Carandang said.

Mr. Aquino said the 1987 Constitution was “very, very clear” that national laws would always take precedence.

“If they [the governors] feel that their rights are being trampled upon, by all means they can go to the appropriate courts,” the President said earlier.

He said the government would also impose a mining ban on 78 eco-tourism sites through the executive order.

Environment Secretary Ramon Paje said the new order would recoup some P760 million in forgone revenues due to the failure to collect occupational fees yearly.

“Application and occupational fees are so dated. The department is planning to hike the P50,000 application fee and increase by a thousand-fold the occupational fees,” Paje told reporters on the sidelines of the Environment Department’s 25th anniversary celebration.

“The moment that a particular area is under a company’s name, that company should start paying its dues. No more grace period.”

A mining company is required to pay its occupational dues once it is granted an exploration permit, minerals production sharing agreement or financial and technical assistance agreement.

The Mining Act actually mandates the collection of an annual occupation fee of P5 per hectare for the exploration permit; P50 per hectare for mineral production sharing agreement and financial or technical assistance agreement; and P100 per hectare for mineral reservation.

Mining stocks rose on Friday, bucking the downtrend in other shares amid speculation that the President had signed an executive order on his minerals policy.

The mining and oil counter, one of the six sub-sectors in the Philippine Stock Exchange, advanced 2.8 percent on Friday despite the overall decline of the PSE index. The index dropped 6 points, or 0.1 percent, to close at 5,362.68.

The stocks of Lepanto Consolidated Mining and Manila Mining Corp. were among the biggest gainers on Friday. Lepanto Consolidated Mining’s stock price increased 7.3 percent to P1.47.

The stock of Philodrill Corp., which has stakes in several mines, also jumped 5.8 percent to P0.055, while Manila Mining Corp.’s stock rose 5.6 percent to P0.075.

Philex Mining Corp. and Benguet Corp. also saw their stocks rise Friday. With Othel V. Campos/MANILA STANDARD

TAMPAKAN SAGITTARIUS MINES, NATIONAL GREENING PROGRAM AND SAVING PHILIPPINE FORESTS

 

 

 

 

Apart from community-based programs under their Corporate Social Responsibility, the most tangible evidence of mining companies complying with rules and regulations on environmental protection under the Philippine Mining Act of 1995 is their programs on reforestation.

The mining act mandates that mining companies must replace if not restore vegetation destroyed in the process of the mining operation.

The Sagittarius Mines Inc. (SMI) behind the US$55 million Tampakan Gold-Copper Project in South Cotabato, is among those closely watched by government on compliance with environmental protection.
But the Department of Ennvironment and Natural Resources (DENR) may not be having headaches in monitoring SMI.
Even before it could start operation in 2016, SMI, with a 10,000-hectare concession that straddles South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat and Davao del Sur, already has set into place a massive and continuing regreening program started as early as 2008.

Tree-planting activities, in the concession area and extending to areas adjacent to it, are ongoing being implemented by SMI and backstopped by peoples organizations, NGOs, socio-civic clubs, schools, corporate entities, Church groups, local overnment units and other sectors who are pursuing their own respective reforestation and tree planting projects and provided by SMI with seedlings and other planting materials.

South Cotabato is a victim of uncontrolled illegal logging in the past, and illegal mining in the present, and has lost nearly all of its forest covers. The SMI greening program is helping it restore lost forests.
As what is happening everywhere, the people of South Cotabato are aware of global warming and how depleted forests had contrubuted to it, and are willing to help over-all efforts to help solve the climatic crisis placing Mother Earth in grave danger.
SMI with its resources may have come as an angel helping in the mission, at least in South Cotabato and its environs, to arrest global warming through its corporate reforestation program and linkages with various groups in the tree planting campaign.

The DENR has acknowledged that mining companies have resources to engage in massive reforestation, not only as part of their compliance with the
Philippine Mining Act, but also as an important partner in the National Greening Program (NGP).
This is the reason why DENR has entered into memorandum of agreements with mining companies foremost of which is the SMI as important partners of the government in the implementation of the NGP.
For its part, SMI has pushed the antes further as far as the greening program is concerned by entering into partnerships with local government units in Region Eleven and Region Twelve in the collaborative effort of successfully implementing the NGP.
Unlike before the mining act of 1995 when mining companies were not mandated to embed reforestation programs in their operations, the mining companies of today are forced to adopt responsible mining as the barometer of how deserving they are of the permits given them by the government.
The “sins of the past” of mining companies–massive floods, forest denudation and other threats to environment and people—are now being addressed by the Philippine Mining Act that imposes responsible mining as the mantra that should govern mining operations that must balance environmental protection with economic activities.

It is with high hopes mining companies would play an important role in the NGP that is targeting about 500,000 hectares for tree planting in the period 2012 to 2016.
The DENR projects the Philippines would have more green forest areas than deforested ones if NGP meets its 2016 goal of planting some 1.5 billion tree seedlings in about 1.5 million hectares of open, denuded and degraded forest land nationwide.
Philippine areas designated as forests account for about half of the country’s estimated total land area of some 30 million hectares.
Studies show that deforestation reduced the country’s forest cover from over 50 percent of land at the 20th century’s start to only about 24 percent at present. ROGER M. BALANZA

SOUTH COTABATO ENVIRONMENTAL CODE GETS PRESIDENTIAL THRASHING

President Aquino says “NATIONAL LAWS OVERRIDE ORDINANCES”

BY ROGER M. BALANZA

The South Cotabato Provincial Government’s Environmental Code has found a nemesis in no less than President Benigno Aquino.
The Environmental Code bans use of the open-pit method in mining in the province even as the method is allowed by the Philippine Mining Act of 1995.
A major casualty of the Ennvironmental Code is the Sagittarius Mines Inc. (SMI) US$5.9 million Tampakan Gold-Copper Project in Tampakan, South Cotabato. The Tampakan project is set to start commercial operation in 2016.
The biggest single direct investment in the Philipines today, SMI, backed by world copper producer Xstrata, has been denied an Environmental Certificate of Clearance (ECC) by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) on the basis of the existence of the South Cotabato Environmental Code.

Apart from the Environmental Code approved by the Provincial Board and supported  by Governor Arthur Pingoy, the Tampakan Project is also facing opposition from environmentalist groups and the Catholic Church led by Archbishop Dinualdo Gutierrez. Mark Williams, SMI vice president,  assured the project would be implemented under highest international standards with strict adherence to international and local environmental laws.
President Aquino has cleared the air on the country’s new mining policy ahead of an upcoming Executive Order that could save mining companies like SMI hobbled by local ordinances like the South Cotabato Enviromental Code.
President Aquino says “NATIONAL LAWS OVERRIDE ORDINANCES.”

LA TRINIDAD—President Benigno Aquino III said Monday the coming executive order on the country’s mining policy will uphold the primacy of national laws over local ordinances despite the threats from 40 governors who have said they will challenge the order before the Supreme Court once it is signed.

Albay Gov. Joey Salceda, a member of Mr. Aquino’s Liberal Party, said last week he would oppose the order because it would allow the national government to override the policies of local executives, but the President said he could not believe the governor would take such a position.

“I would like to talk to him [Salceda] but I think the premise of your question is wrong,” Mr. Aquino said.

“Where did that happen? I don’t think Joey Salceda would come up with a statement that says that a municipal order or provincial ordinance takes precedence over our national law.

“The Constitution is very, very clear on that. First, the ordinance-making powers of local governments are limited. Second, they have limited territorial scope. But more than all of these, there is a clause that says local ordinances should be consistent with our national laws.”

Mr. Aquino said that as long as the Philippines was not a federated government, the national laws would always take precedence over local laws. And it was premature to criticize the executive order because he had not signed it yet.

“There is still some language I am not comfortable with,” Mr. Aquino said.

“But if they feel that their rights are being trampled upon, by all means they can go to the appropriate courts. But I am very confident that he [Salceda] did not say that [local] ordinances … will supplant national laws.”

Earlier, Mr. Aquino said the executive order would impose more stringent regulations on small-scale mining operations.

He said the order would also impose a mining ban on 78 eco-tourism sites.

Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr. said the order would establish a Mining Council that will resolve the revenue-sharing issues.

The taxes and royalties that the government now collects from mining operations amount to only 10 percent of the total revenues of mining firms.

The President on Monday assured communities that they would enjoy the benefits of mining in their areas of jurisdiction, and that the government would respect local ordinances in line with national laws.

Meanwhile, Quezon City Rep. Winston Castelo, an administration ally, has  filed a resolution seeking an investigation of the billions of  pesos that the national government supposedly loses as a result of the small-scale mining being operated by syndicates.

His House resolution 2326 asks the House committee on natural resources to look into the mining operations being controlled by dishonest people including Chinese businessmen who are not paying taxes.

Castelo says the Environment Department, the Environment Department, the Mines and Geosciences Bureau and the Bureau of Internal Revenue must submit to Congress a comprehensive report on the extent of small-scale mining in the country to determine  those  who are making a killing but not paying taxes.

“The legitimate large-scale mining industry provides two million jobs to the Filipino people and, correspondingly, the taxes on large-scale mining accrue to the government under a closely monitored or regulated arrangement,” Castelo says in his resolution.

By contrast, he says, small-scale miners deprive the government of much-needed revenues.