Coalition of Agricultural Workers International

22nd August 2005

Mr.Bryan Yap,
President / Chief Operating Officer,
Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company.

Dear Sir,

We are deeply concerned over the protracted labour dispute at Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company, Mankayan, Benguet. We understand that the Lepanto Employees Union has been on strike since June 2 2005 due to a deadlock on Collective Bargaining Agreement.

"Tiempo Muerto" (dead times) are bad times for cane workers. They go hungry because there is no work and are neglected by landowners. Last Aug. 17, close to a thousand hungry-stricken sugar workers and farmers trooped to the office of the provincial government in Negros Occidental to demand immediate food and production subsidies.

Philippine agriculture has been the main indicator of the Filipino society, describing it quite as a whole. At the countrysides, the level of technological production remains backward and the relations are predominantly feudal between the big landlords and comprador bourgeoisie and the landless peasants.

It is common knowledge that in its zealous drive to earn super-profits, transnational corporations (TNCs) employ all methods - thinkable and unthinkable - to exploit human and natural resources, sell their products and keep their industries afloat in the market.