BY ERWIN ‘AMBO’ DELILAN
UNKNOWN to some, the country’s sugar-producing giant, Victorias Milling Company (VMC) in Negros Occidentaln is in “hot water” anew.
Both its sugar mill complex in Victorias City and distillery plant in Manapla town are being complained for unabated air and water pollutions.
Lo and behold, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) central office in Manila has ordered an immediate investigation on these pollution allegations.
What a bad “birthday present” for VMC, which just turned 102 years old on May 7, 2021.
This, as the former Osorio-led VMC conglomerate has once suffered from “darkest moments” in the hands of the so-called “Magnificent 7”.
Tobacco and airline magnate Lucio Tan, however, acted as “messiah” in saving VMC, one of the economic pillars of Negros, from the ultimate “financial drowning”.
And Tan succeeded!
Hence, Negrenses were thankful to Tan and his business allies for making VMC great again.
But to be tagged as the next “polluter” in northern Negros or the “greatest” violator of both Clean Air Act of 2020 (Republic Act No. 8749) and Clean Water Act of 2004 (RA No. 9275) is another story.
Isn’t it alarming?
Negrenses, for sure, if it’s true, won’t embrace this newest title for VMC.
But thanks to DENR which gave an utmost attention to the letter-complaint of a certain Regoberto Soriano of Canetown Subdivision in Barangay XIX, Victorias City.
Soriano’s letter was specifically addressed to President Duterte thru environment czar Roy Cimatu.
He underscored the unstoppable harmful flying vestiges coming from VMC mill site, causing respiratory and skin illnesses among Canetown residents.
Finding merit on Soriano’s complaint, Merlinda Manila, DENR’s Action Center and Hotline head, immediately issued a memorandum (dated April 21, 2021) to Environment Management Bureau (EMB) Regional Office 6 director Ramar Niel Pascua to conduct an immediate investigation.
And in the memo (which I got hold last week), Manila told Pascua that, “failure to respond to this public concern shall be ground for administrative sanctions under existing laws and regulations.”
Sans further ado, Pascua and his team called up Soriano and the technical team of VMC for a conference to resolve the matter on April 30, 2021.
Gab results, however, are still being processed (as of this writing).
But EMB Region 6’s chief attorney, Arjunn Calvo, promised to furnish me a copy of the results of their investigation sooner.
And I’ll wait for that promise in the spirit of fairness, of course.
On the other hand, in a notice of hearing (dated April 27, 2021, signed by Pascua and sent to Soriano), the EMB-6 chief disclosed the earlier results of the Ambient Air Quality Monitoring (AAQM) conducted by its agency at the said subdivision on March 30, 2021 at exactly 7 p.m.
Underscored by him, it exceeded the National Ambient Air Quality Guideline Value for Sources Specific Air Pollutants.
So VMC, said Pascua, promised to establish a real time Ambient Air Quality Monitoring Station with meteorological data in Victorias City, specifically at Canetown Subdivision.
The purpose of this, he added, is to monitor the ground level concentrations of ambient air pollutants especially the particulate matter.
Meanwhile, the controversial VMC distillery plant in Barangay Purisima, Manapla town recently agitated again another “war” on Facebook between the pro- and anti-supporters of the plant.
Hacienda Candelaria and Sitio Pili natives in the barangay continue to abuzz both in the mainstream and social media regarding the slop released by the plant every day that they said causes foul odor and damages to their rice and vegetable farms.
The opposite group (pro management), however, dismissed the allegations and labeled such as another “money making” scheme aimed at extorting money from the company.
This group doesn’t want the distillery to cease operations for economic reason.
Which is which?
I contacted the firm’s plant manager, Engineer Sherwin Bacanto, to get some reactions but he replied: “I’ve already left VMC last February.”
No further elaboration as to the reason(s) of his resignation.
VMC distillery plant was rehabilitated and put back in operation sometime in November 2011.
Starting then, it produces around 28,000 liters of potable or ethyl alcohol (per day) used in the manufacturing of rum and other alcohol spirits.
But the pollution brouhaha necessitated the VMC management to shut down the plant in June last year.
Five months later, the plant operations resumed with VMC “boasting” the P200-million worth of investment for environmental upgrades in Purisima.
But the company’s announcement made via press conference on Nov. 11, 2020 was jeered by some Purisima natives, especially the professionals, calling it as another “corporate lie”.
Recently, some residents consistently complained about their damaged rice fields with substantial reduction of yield, and fish kill in the river from time-to-time.
They boldly blamed the wastewater discharged by VMC distillery as the culprit behind these adversities.
The foul odor, claimed Melanie Dumasig, a mother of three, also caused Purisima kids and senior citizens to get sick.
A Candelaria native, Dumasig emphasized that most of them now suffer from asthma.
Manapla mayor Manuel “Manolet” Escalante, in previous media reports, vowed to revoke the plant’s business permit should it continue to cause pollution.
VMC distillery is one of the town’s top local taxpayers. Escalante, though, stressed he can’t compromise people’s lives and the environment.
Purisima has around 8,000 villagers, according to the 2015 Philippine Statistics Authority Census.
To further understand the issue, I did my personal research regarding distillery plants.
Such led me to scientifically understand that distillery wastewater without any treatment can result to depletion of dissolved oxygen in the receiving water streams.
Thus, it poses threat to the aquatic flora and fauna.
Green Technologies and Environmental Sustainability article posted by the www.springerprofessional.de website also underlined that distillery waste water is a major source of environmental pollution.
Hence, EMB’s immediate attention is also needed here.
And if the people’s complaints were found praiseworthy, EMB can immediately revoke the firm’s environmental compliance certificate (ECC).
Without an ECC, the VMC distillery plant can’t operate again until the pollution dispute is resolved.
As a vanguard of environment, EMB’s mandated responsibility is to see to it that environmental protection and preservation can’t be compromised, including people’s health and livelihood amidst industrialization.
VMC, too, must seriously invest now on (available) state-of-the –art anti-pollution tools.
It must also strengthen its corporate social responsibility (CSR) in its host communities via information and education campaign (IEC).
It needs to balance profit and people and environment’s welfare. Thus, it is a “must” for VMC to hear people’s cry.
Likewise, the company must stop vaunting that its distillery plant generates more and more jobs because “it is but natural”. Jobs or income (still) cannot be equated with the loss of lives and degradation of environment.
In sum, VMC must ponder about the danger of the so-called resource curse because, after all, the earth is what we all have in common!/PN
