Ifugao Rice Terraces should be resuscitated

Before the war, Florence Horn came out with a book on the Philippines entitled Orphans of the Pacific. She was full of praise for the rice terraces in Baguio calling it "world’s greatest system of stone-walled terraces. Here was her description:

"Stretched end to end, the terraces would reach halfway round the world. To build them, no one knows how many thousand years ago, the Ifugaos carried the stones up from the river bed far below. They built the terraces with skill of trained engineers. Sometimes a terrace wall rises as high as 75 feet; its area is often greater than the rice-growing surface it was built to support. To hold the water, the terraces are carefully lined with clay.

"No water is wasted. The knowledge of irrigation possessed by the pagan Ifugao people amazes scientists, as does their knowledge of forestry. An Ifugao knows well the effect of trees on his water supply. If someone cuts a tree here, even far from an Ifugao’s rice terrace, his crime will be punished (in the old days, his head might have been cut off). What little forest remains in the Ifugao country is guarded as faithfully as the gold in Fort Knox. If the water supply runs low, from lack of rain, an Ifugao will sprinkles his rice only at night (with a bamboo contraption punctured with holes), so that less water will be lost by evaporation. If the situation gets worse, an Ifugao makes an important decision. If he owns four terraces, he may decide that he must sacrifice one of them to save the rest of his crop. He will withhold the water from one, using all his irrigation for the other three. All this and much more the pagan Ifugao, who is an engineer, forester, and agriculturist, knows. His uncanny wisdom is unrecorded. His knowledge, which includes an elaborate calendar, is handed down verbally from generation to generation.

The Ifugao works hard, much harder than the ‘civilized’ lowlander. He wastes nothing. Pig manure, wild sunflowers, and any other weeds he can find in uncultivated spots in the mountains, he puts into the rice terrace for fertilizer. He plants camotes whenever he can on unterraced slopes. His diet is largely rice and camotes, with an occasional hog or chicken for big celebrations. There are, too, edible snails on the rice terraces. Swarms of locusts appear every now and then and are caught in a kind of butterfly net. Apparently they taste good, if your diet is as limited as an Ifugao’s. The scant clothing – a G-string for the man, a skirt for the woman – is hand-woven, and of a simple striped design. "The women work as hard as the men, and their tasks are clearly defined by tradition."

Now the rice terraces are fast deteriorating. This is because many terraces have been converted into vegetable gardens. Some in fact produce illegal crops such as marijuana. But the worst is that many fields have been abandoned due to rice paddy erosion, giant earthworm infestation, and the irrigation system is not properly maintained.

The government must give more financial assistance to preserve and restore the terraces. But the key to their preservation is the maintenance of the traditional culture that is responsible for their erection in the first place. We are referring to the rituals and festivals that revolved in the different stages of rice production. The national rice variety grown in the Banaue Rice Terraces is known as Ipugo. Ifugao Governor Teodoro Baguilat, Jr. is taking the lead in the revival of old Ifugao customs by the most appropriate way of insuring the conservation of the terraces. We hope that the national government gives him all the support he needs.