A total of 51 agriculture groups – composed of farmers, fishers, and producers – have joined forces to sign a petition against the mega trade deal, Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).

The groups think the deal will result in further “import surges, price depressions, and displacement of local production.”

“We – the undersigned representatives of farmers, fishers, workers, civil society organizations, and the private sector – unanimously oppose the ratification of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership trade agreement and urge the Senate to withhold its concurrence on the treaty,” the position paper reads.

The groups claimed that the RCEP agreement, including its legal text and schedule of Philippine commitments, was finalized without consulting agri-fisheries stakeholders, many of whom are directly affected by the treaty’s trade rules and concessions.

"Moreover, no more opportunity exists today to modify our commitments or the legal text of the agreement. We have not seen any clear and consistent basis for classifying agricultural tariff lines in the country’s schedule of tariff concessions," the groups said.

"Joining RCEP now means that 75 percent of our 1,718 agricultural tariff lines will be set at zero. About 15 percent of tariff lines will be subjected to tariff reduction, while 9 percent will be exempted from any tariff change. A more detailed breakdown and evaluation of our obligations are necessary to ensure that no mistakes have been made and that sufficient policy space remains to protect sensitive commodities," it added.

According to the groups, "more worrisome" are proposed RCEP rules that will significantly hamper the application and effectiveness of trade remedies. These measures, such as safeguard duties, will be the only legal recourse to address import surges and other problems engendered by freer trade under RCEP.

Any form of quantitative restriction (QR) — like suspending sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) import clearances during harvest periods — is strongly discouraged by RCEP and is also prohibited by the Philippines' Rice Tariffication Law (RTL), although World Trade Organization (WTO) rules allow for temporary QR imposition under certain critical situations.

RCEP also limits the allowable safeguard duty to the difference between a country’s applied most favored nation (MFN) tariff at any point during RCEP implementation and the RCEP tariff in effect when the safeguard remedy is invoked.

For example, if the applied MFN tariff for a product is 35 percent, and the Philippines' tariff commitment under RCEP is down to 25 percent when an import surge occurs, the country can only impose a safeguard duty not exceeding 10 percent. Hence, sensitive products like rice, corn, and some fishery and livestock products — to be exempted from any tariff reduction under RCEP — might ironically be deprived of any safeguard protection, since their tariff at any time during RCEP implementation could already equal their applied MFN tariff.

"We question the rosy projections on benefits from RCEP membership, and the purported losses if we stay outside the trade bloc come January 2022. We have heard such claims before, starting with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)-Uruguay Round Agreement and the various regional and bilateral trade agreements that followed. We still have to see evidence that these optimistic forecasts have materialized," the groups further said.

"Performance data instead show a continuing deterioration in our terms of trade – minimal increases in exports, no expansion beyond traditional commodities, ballooning imports, and widening trade deficits. Nor is there any indication that our prospects will improve under RCEP. We, therefore, deem the claims regarding benefits from RCEP membership as overly presumptive, highly misleading, and manifestly deceptive," they added.

The groups were led by Nicanor Briones, president of Agricultural Sector Alliance of the Philippines, Inc.; Ernesto Ordonez, chairman of Alyansa Agrikultura; Rafael Mariano, former Agrarian Reform Secretary and Chairperson of Anakpawis Party-List; Joji Co, president of Philippine Confederation of Grains Associations, among many others.