Published December 14, 2020, 7:12 PM
With 221 members voting in the affirmative, the House of Representatives on Monday approved on third and final reading the bill declaring the coconut levy assets as a trust fund and providing for its management and utilization that will ensure benefits for coconut farmers and workers.
MANILA BULLETIN FILE PHOTO
The six members of the Makabayan bloc voted against House Bill 8136 as they pointed out that the legislative measure will only further deny the farmers and coconut plantation workers access to the funds collected during the martial law years.
Speaker Lord Allan Velasco lauded his colleagues for the passage of the measure, saying that this will be a “fitting Christmas gift to more than three million coconut farmers who stand to benefit from the proposed coco levy trust fund.”
Published December 14, 2020, 5:00 AM
Coconut farmers are questioning some provisions of the Coconut Farmers and Industry Trust Fund Act (Coco Levy Act) such as the annual allocation of portions of the P100-billion coco levy fund to several government agencies, some of which have had no participation in coconut industry development at all.
In a press briefing, Joey Faustino, leader of the Coconut Industry Reform Movement, said coconut farmers are appealing to junk the Senate Bill (SB) 1396 or the Coco Levy Act in fear that they may totally lose the chance to benefit from the P100-billion coco levy fund, which came from the taxes imposed on coconut farmers by the Marcos administration and its cronies from 1972 to 1981.