Bamboo Economics

History of Development

 Before the advent of industrialization and cash-based transactions, bamboo had played a significant role in the self-sustaining economies in many nations that are now grouped together as developing countries (it still does in some remote parts of our country yet untouched by modern economics).
 This is hardly surprising, considering that bamboo is the fastest growing and most useful plant in the world. One of its most common uses was as a building material for shelters. Bamboo houses were a tradition and even today, millions of rural houses in Asia prominently feature bamboo in their construction. Research has proved bamboo’s admirable engineering and mechanical qualities, and its aesthetics have never been in question. Still, when it comes to construction, bamboo has largely remained a poor man’s choice.
There have been attempts in different parts of the world to address this paradox: scientists, engineers, designers, development practitioners have all contributed to these efforts that aimed to win recognition for bamboo as a modern and immensely useful material.

Development and Poverty

Moreover, the irony of the third world countries vis-à-vis developing countries, the twinge of poverty in these countries has bewildered development practitioners for decades. Despite various development-oriented efforts, mostly by Western countries, the conditions of poverty have not only persisted but worsened. Development through large-scale industrialization like rubber in Makilala which barely reduce the poverty incidence and palm oil industry in Agusan ranks them as the poorest region in Mindanao and has only brought wealth and luxury to only small numbers of urban elite, while leaving large rural populations to scrape for resources.
Development initiatives have often displaced rural families from lands which they have been cultivating at subsistence level or to produce food for selling in local markets. Many farmers have been forced to become mere wage laborers for estate-owning elites. Not only have the rural people been left with few employment options to support their livelihood, it has also become difficult to buy the food that they once used to produce themselves. Absence of land and decent wage-earning opportunities has also taken away shelters, relegating them to live in makeshift homes.
As rural people became wage laborers, producing crops for what became export-laden economies, their wealth transferred into the hands of the small urban elite class and Western investors. Income disparities widened significantly between urban and rural populations. Urban areas experienced enormous growth, and urban wealth created substantial infrastructures in education, health facilities, services and utilities, and employment, not to mention the availability of basic human necessities such as food and shelter. At the same time, underdevelopment persisted in rural communities where lack of wealth led to declines in socio-economic status.
One of the effects of greater urban development has been a high rate of rural to urban migration. Rural underdevelopment necessitated the search for better opportunities elsewhere. Employment, higher wages, and access to education and health care have been major impetuses for urban migration. Unfortunately, these opportunities often proved illusory for many migrants woke to the harsh realization of being unqualified for urban service jobs.

False Hope

Thus, migration served only to perpetuate their state of underemployment and impoverishment. Again, people were living in makeshift homes along the periphery urban "paradises". These urban shantytowns were no better than their rural counterparts -there was no running water, electricity, or access to education and health systems, and their shelters could barely withstand a heavy wind or rain.
Another major effect of urban development and rural underdevelopment has been extensive environmental degradation resulting from deforestation. Massive projects, such as monocropped agro-industrial developments, large scale mining, mass housing, dams to produce hydroelectric power, have cleared large areas of forest.
The proposed hydro electric project in Bukidnon was strongly opposed for it will obviously displace people in the hinterlands and risking the dangers of those living in the low lying areas. Cordillera Alliance Party had successfully silenced the loud roar of development for the supplying of power to the urban settlers and denying the opportunity for a just living of the hydro electric power plant project. Why not choose other option in generating power supply like bio oil/bio coal from bamboo?. Environmentally, the activity of producing bamboo products does not disturb the balance of the natural environment, since the primary natural resource used is bamboo, which regenerates rapidly, and all other sources of energy are fully renewable.
Again, these “development” projects have also marginalized rural peasants and other indigenous communities by pushing them off their land and forcing them to relocate in alternative sites, leading to further clearing of massive tracts of forested lands for rehabilitation by uprooted people.
Development of tropical countries into export economies has only intensified the rate of deforestation. Forests were clear-cut to make land available to raise cattle for beef exports, to sustain the timber trade and timber production which literally could be replaced by bamboo, and for the large-scale production of profitable cash crops for export. Agricultural industrialization has also served to severely divest rich tropical lands of their natural resource base. The result of all these development initiatives has been a vicious cycle of mass impoverishment and environmental degradation. It is time to think as to what might happen to the livelihoods of those living in tropical countries if and when their natural resources become completely exhausted. We should stop this vicious cycle into virtuous cycle by adhering into bamboo development initiatives.

Twilight of Hope

With the realization that past several development initiatives cannot be deemed successful, newer attempts are taking a more grassroots approach, instead of the trickle-down version of development through industrialization and capitalism. The belief is that community level work is a better approach to poverty alleviation.
Newer initiatives also advocate that real participation by community members in the development process is a key element for successful and sustainable social and economic betterment. Furthermore, recognizing that a continual disregard for the environment and natural resources may actually impede or even halt development, there is greater emphasis now on environmentally sound initiatives.  
Harvesting of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) is an environmentally sound development effort with a great deal of potential. This practice offers an alternative to clear-cutting and stripping forests to the point of zero utility – sustainable extraction of plant resources for the benefit of present and future generations.  Working at the community level, these projects deal with the generation of livelihood income, and create value-added products, such as products for home demand and exports, to generate more income than the sale of only raw materials. Medicines, cosmetics and dyes are some of the other value-added products that come from NTFPs or bamboos.

Old but New

Experts’ points out that bamboo and rattan are the most important NTFPs, both economically and socially, in the Asian region. Bamboo is particularly interesting in that it shows a promising future as a resource for environmentally sustainable development. For instance, its timber-like qualities have implications for indirectly curbing the deforestation resulting from timber demand. Because it is an abundant and inexpensive resource with strong historical and traditional uses in less developed countries (LDCs), it would be logical to use bamboo as a socio-economic resource for development initiatives in these places.
Having learned that capitalism and industrialization do not necessarily lead to poverty alleviation in LDCs, the search for more "fitting" technologies has become important. Environmental advocates found better technologies, which can reduce ecological damage and increase the income of local people while preserving natural resources for future use. This idea is particularly important for resource-poor people who, in the past, have not had much choice regarding their manner of survival.
As previously mentioned, many of these people have been driven to overexploit natural resources, leading to extensive environmental damage. With a new emphasis on sustainable use of bamboo, implementing technologies and methodologies to compensate the resource-poor without compromising the environment would result in more equitable development for present and future generations of people, besides being better for the natural environment.
Today, there are bamboo advocates who are examining historical and traditional bamboo technologies and how these can be implemented more effectively to improve people’s lives in developing countries. Case study research on bamboo utilization allows for the improvement of methodologies and updating of information: something that is especially important for the development and use of appropriate technology because the impact of a chosen technology and its implementation are important for learning purposes.

Social Impact in the Local Scene

Climate change is one of the few problems facing society today that has the potential to reshape life on earth. Increasing greenhouse gases (GHGs), primarily due to human causes, are raising earth's temperatures. Temperature increases will have lasting, potentially devastating impacts on the ecological and economic systems that will affect human life and society for generations to come.
 Among the environmentally deprived regions, Greater Manila Area, Central Visayas, and the catch basins of Central Mindanao have maximum population density that suffered a lot with the revenge of nature, and therefore the problem is more acute in these areas.
These areas are affected by poverty or reprisal of Gaia (god of Earth), or both. Thus, there is an urgent need for development of a bamboo resource base through a massive program of improved planting stocks. Improvement of bamboo through genetic enhancement has hardly been thought of, although the potential in this field is enormous. Thanks to the generosity of Etsuzo Uchimura of FOBAR, Japan that transferred the technology to Dr. Alfinetta Zamora of UP Los Baños, Philippines that developed the tissue culture and presently the UP Mindanao is on the process of transferring the technology to cater the needs of the adjacent regions.

Climate Change or Erratic Weather?

The alarming rate of deforestation has also accelerated soil and genetic erosion, especially in areas of indigenous bamboo cultivations, in the central Mindanao region such as the palay producing towns in 1st and 2nd congressional district of Cotabato, PALMA complex was submerged into the water for four days, first time it its entire history that flood waters swell up to the municipal plaza of Pigcawayan, M’lang had experienced that the almost 20 meters high bridge was underwater for the first time, rural areas around Linggawasan Marsh was immensely affected by the frequent flooding.

The swelling of Kabacan and Marbel River that killed a father and a son when they crossed a small creek when sudden magnitude of water tossed them, in Magpet a child was missing when a sudden rush of water came, Nuangan River in Kidapawan City, 3 high school students were dead among the thirteen who were washed out without warning by the flashflood, and in Pres. Roxas which was traversed by Kabacan River had suffered in losses including lives and properties. Grebona Bridge was toppled down for the second time, in Libungan and the Alamada River Flooding which attracts foreign attentions had claimed its accolade. Truly our eyes can be easily fooled by the aerial view of the green forest, but the green forest that you had seen today is not as green as the forest of 1960s.

Let us welcome the new and realistic development, the bamboo industry, as catalyst for change, it changes its environment for the betterment by not changing its natural state.