Recto doesn't mince words, calls China move a 'food blockade' vs PH

Batangas 6th district Rep. Ralph Recto (Facebook)

Calling a spade a spade, House Deputy Speaker and Batangas 6th district Rep. Ralph Recto has described China's latest action in the West Philippine Sea (WPS) as a "food blockade" against the Philippines. 

"China must be called out for what it is really doing in the WPS: a food blockade that is a crime against humanity," Recto said in a statement Monday, Sept. 25. 

"By cutting our access to a major protein source, China is playing a different kind of hunger games, making fish scarce for us, while satiating its people’s large appetite for seafood," he said. 

The former Senator Pro Tempore was referring to Beijing's recent installation of floating barriers in Scarborough Shoal. 

"It has fenced off Bajo de Masinloc, claiming it as a backyard fishpond, and declaring it off limits to its true owners -- the Filipinos. Some of the fish it feeds its 1.412 billion citizens are poached from Philippine waters, vacuum-cleaned from our rich reefs," Recto said of China. 

He said the value of this stolen fish is "in the billions of pesos, not annually, but monthly". 

"Because of this Chinese blockade, share of our fish catch in the WPS, according to BFAR, has dwindled to 7 percent of total national fisheries production," he said. 

And then there's the long-held suspicion that fish illegally caught jn Philippine territory are being imported by the country. 

"As we grapple with fish shortage, partly due to the fact that our access to WPS has been denied, we resort to imports. And the painful irony is that we buy fish from China--.the very source of our discontent," Recto said. 

The House leader said that since 2016, the volume and value of the Philippines' imports have growing. "In 2021, import volume jumped 31.48 percent from the previous year." 

"Nagkahalaga ito ng P36.89 billion. Bawat araw P101 milyon na halaga ng isda ang lumanding sa ating bansa. Sa kwentang ito, hindi pa kasama ang smuggled. Kaya ang ginagawa ng China ay isang malakas na suntok sa ating sikmura," he said. 

(This is worth P36.89 billion. Some P101 million worth of fish imports land on the country each day. This doesn't even include the smuggled fish. That's why what China is doing is a strong punch in the gut.)