....."B'LAAN ECONOMIC STRUCTURES"......

.......Economic Structures......

     Some contemporary B'laans believe that the practice of Kaingin (swidden or slash and burn) started in the past, when the vast plains and mountains were theirs for the taking.  They could afford to leave one place after harvest and allow natural vegetation to re-grow.  They rely on the notion that kaingin provides for a fertilized farm, as the ashes of  burnt foliage serve as nutrition for the soil.
       The Tribal Filipino being kaingin (swidden or slash and burn) farmers who must move from place to place within a defined are, and who also depend on the forest, rivers and fauna for their livelihood.  A groups agreed that occupying and cultivation are the main conditions for ownership of the land with regards to vacate the land, the prior cultivator still had some ownership rights, in that his permission was required before another could cultivate the area.  However, the fruit of trees planted by the former cultivators still belong to him.  All respondents agreed that there is no time limit in the rights of prior cultivators.  Among the B'laan, the right is passed on the relations of the prior cultivator in event of his death,  Land ownership and customary laws. 
     Agriculture is considered to be the predominant form of highland B'laan economic subsistence.  Corn or agol has become the primary crop.  However, other forms of agricultural produce, such as camote or kasila kayo and atboli (two varieties of sweet potatoes) and also cultivated.
      Kaingin (swidden or slash and burn) ...method of farming, characterized by burning, the cutting after harvest, strips the land of its vegetation and diminished soil fertility.  The land is abandoned after harvest.
     Kaingin is unquestionably inter wined with the B'laans wandering way of life.  Rice and corn are the first crops planted in the cycle, followed by camote or kasila and other root crops.  They could afford to leave one place after harvest and allow natural vegetation to region.  They rely on the notion that kaingin provides for a fertilized form, as the ashes of burnt foliage serve as nutrition for the soil.
        At the time the man cut the trees and underbrush and after allowing them to dry, fire them.  They also make the holes into which the women drop seed rice.  Aside from clearing the land helping some what with the rice crops, the men seldom concern themselves with work in the field but leave the cultivation of corn, sweet potatoes (camote), tobacco, and the like to the women.
      Preparation of the meals, care of the children, basket and mat making, weaving and decorations of clothing, taking up most of the time of the women when they are not engaged in the cultivation of the fields or in search of forest products.
   To B'laan, the land is not a lifeless shell of rock and sand.  Instead, it is a dynamic and animate creation that must be looked after, cared for and nurtured in order to ensure its continued survival of the life forms and spiritual ensure that coexist within its realms.  The land, the trees, the wild life to the current generation of B'laan to be cared or "binantay banwu ne".
      The B'laans henceforth, consider it unholy to claim ownership of nature, air, land, water, forests and etc.  For them, land is a direct creation of God and cannot be owned by human beings.  Man is allowed its use and should learn to utilized it properly.  If not, M-fun Tana will destroy the land by earthquake or cause erosion and destruction of the soil.  So, the B'laan will fill a piece of land for the production of food crops.  After its use, the B'laan will return the land to the community and move to adjacent spots to repeat the same activity.
B'laans, with their limited technology and resources, estimate their average harvest at 120 sacks of corn per hectare when the weather is favorable with drought, harvest drops as low as to 70 sacks of corn yielding  around 25 sacks of dried corn with each sacks weighing 50n kilos.  Though the B'laans practice slash and burn agriculture, the commercial loggers systematically harvested the timber and other forest products scarcely
concerned about reforestation.
TRANSPORT.....B'laan often use pack horses to transport goods from the harvested areas to a trucking point or depot.  Horsemen, who have been contracted to carry sacks of grain, are often seen along the trail.  The average contract rate for a horseman is 35 per sack, with each horse carrying two sacks of grains.  Occasionally caribaw are used to pull sleds, which have been loaded with sacks of grain.  Where the truck used by the caribaw sleds meet the main road the sacks of grains are usually transferred unto truck for transport to the market center.

      Landless is the primary problem of present day by the  B'laans. Almost all land, once claimed as their hunting ground and farmlands, have became properties of christian settlers.
The B'laans are no longer nomadic and have gradually inhabited the land permanently.  But they have driven to marginal land and step mountain sides.  Economic subordination forced them to either flee to avoid interference in their ways or live the fringes of christian communities as tenants, farm workers and servants.
      Of the past, there are resentments only regrets.  As articulated by a B'laan leader of the mountain (bolul)."If we were only warned and told that in the elimination of our forests, we would ourselves be eliminated ..we would have stopped die loggers...but it is not too late.. we can still save what is left and perhaps give our children something better than what we now have".  To the B'laans, countless promises were made and left unfulfilled.  Nothing much the changed in their economic improvement even as they have embraced the christian cultures.  The B'laan singular beliefs, however, have made their vulnerable to economic and political exploitation brought by christianization.
      The B'laan, secure in their mountain domains, were unaware of the land laws.  They were secluded and ignorant of the outside world.  During the time, Mindanao had yet to be conquered.  The B'laans were easily enticed by the settlers to tell their land for a few cans of sardines or a sack of rice or used clothes.  Hence, the B'laans, were made strangers or squatters in their ancestral lands.  The most sweeping of the encroachments on the territorial domain came with LOI no. 138 issued by the President F. Marcos on Oct.23. 1973.  The law stipulated the determination of areas which should be served for logging reforestation, parks, wildlife sanctuaries.  The original B'laan territorial domain therefore ceased to exist.
      The commission warned that any attempt to further marginalize the B'laans right over their land would mean the possible eruption of a bloody war and of retaliation and violence.  Bishop declared that, "anything that degrades or destroys or deprives cultural minorities of their habitat is inhuman".  He further stressed the necessity to pursue "Liberating Education Towards Self Determination", for the B'laans in their right to survival as a distinct people and as human beings.  A provision of the bill mandates the said congressional commission to identify and circumscribe territorial boundaries of ancestral domain.  This peace pact is still religiously observed between and among the tribal Filipino in Mindanao.
      For the B'laans peace, and harmony  are primary prerequisites to community life.  Of unity, the B'laans declared in the First Assembly of Lumad  Mindanao.  We shall unite with other tribes, and forgive our enemies through the Say- yandi because we want to live peacefully.  This is for the sake of our old D'yande and the welfare of our generations.  Thus, should be respected for whoever will trespass this pact shall be condemned or forsaken to death, by whole B'laan tribes.
     The B'laan fundamental law, "Help your neighbor, do good and give rice- do not steel, do not kill (the innocent), predisposed peaceful co-existence among themselves and their neighbor.  To the B'laans, the secret of long life is  "good and righteous living- to do good, God grants long life.  For the B'laan, the traditional culture crystallized their ethnic identity.  Much to their disappointment and shattered dreams, the B'laan culture now stands at the threshold of extinction- a languishing  society borne of integrating the old with the new.