Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, May 27) — Black sand mining has been “massive” along the Luzon coastline with Chinese miners extracting the mineral with “heavy” equipment and shipping them out in “barges”, according to a lawmaker from the Singson clan of the Ilocos region.
The situation warrants the imposition of a ban against exporting black sand ore, or magnetite, an ore of iron used in steel production, Probinsyano Ako party list representative Jose “Bonito” Singson, Jr. said during a committee hearing on Wednesday.
Singson is the author of House Bill No. 6321 that seeks to prohibit the exportation of black sand and its derivatives in its raw form to other countries.
Industry data show black sand mining in the Ilocos Region, including Cagayan, as well as in Leyte.
The Ilocos Region faces the South China Sea or the West Philippine Sea that China increasingly has been trying to militarize. China’s huge appetite for steel has brought it closer to Philippine shores, and Singson says that’s a red flag: Luzon’s coastlines are receding.
“They [Chinese miners] would bring their barge and then they would use massive machineries to extract the black sand from our shoreline,” Singson told lawmakers as the House committee on Natural Resources tackles his proposed bill.
“Ang shoreline natin, lumiit na, umiksi na. [Our shoreline is receding],” he pointed out.
Ronald Recidoro, Chamber of Mines executive director who attended the Wednesday virtual hearing, shared a similar observation.
“Lumalabas na [It appears] the contractor is helping by dredging the river, pero bakit kina-cart out yung buhangin? [but why does the contractor cart out black sand?] When you dredge, you just put it aside,” he said in a separate interview, adding that the regulatory regime for magnetite black sand really needs to be reviewed since the national government currently has no oversight function on this.
Both Singson and industry group Chamber of Mines said black sand mining should be covered by national policy, such that the national government should keep watch over black sand miners whose operations span as far as Cagayan that is prone to massive flooding. Raw black sand should first be processed locally to create a domestic industry that generates jobs, they added.
“We have steel manufacturing plants in Iligan that use only recycled steel/iron and imported iron as raw materials,” Recidoro said.
“I think one key factor is scale. Steel mills will need a lot of iron ore to feed their smelters, and that cannot yet be met by local miners. The steel industry will still have to rely on imports to remain competitive,” he added.
Recidoro also pointed out that if the government can connect the miners with ore processors, “there is no need for us to impose a ban on iron ore exports—because the local miners would be selling their output to a domestic foundry and/or steel mill.”
The Department of Trade and Industry argued that a ban on mineral exports could be tantamount to violating some provisions of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) of the World Trade Organization (WTO).
The controversy over the illegal operations by Chinese companies and small-scale miners mining black sand in Ilocos and Cagayan dates back to the time of President Noynoy Aquino.
Aquino launched a crackdown on illegal small scale miners but his executive order has been amended by President Rodrigo Duterte via Executive Order 130, igniting debates again.
