The second worst place to be when disaster strikes

HAVE you ever watched “The Big Picture with Kal Penn” on the National Geographic channel? Its host and producer, Kal Penn, explores and generates infographics from data banks and makes statistical analyses to simplify things and make the audience understand with ease otherwise unfathomable worldwide data and figures.

In one episode, Penn focused on natural disasters, investigating how some of the hardest hit places on the planet are surviving nature’s worst earthly calamities.

Penn asked: “What happens when you combine all the world’s major disasters in one map? Drought, earthquakes, floods, hurricanes. But there are a few places that are more or less, free from natural disasters – Greenland, Kazakhstan and Libya. The rest of the world isn’t so lucky.”

The frequency and occurrence of these major disasters are plotted against a world map, showing a distinct pattern of colors. From here, Penn concluded: “Here are the top five countries you don’t want to be in.” China was placed at the bottom of the top five. Ahead of it at No. 4 is India with Indonesia placing third.

I was surprised when I saw the Philippines occupy the second spot in the “worst place you don’t want to be in” when disaster strikes. Mind you, the analysis was based on 2015 world disaster indexes.

What if it included the 2016 and 2017 disasters that hit the Philippines?

Business greed aggravates natural disasters

In this country, natural disasters are aggravated by the illegal manmade activities such as logging and mining. Forest covers are continuously removed and denuded. Mountains are stripped open and left as ticking time bombs – until a natural disaster strikes.

The unabated destruction of our environment is done in the name

One prime example is the recent tropical depression Urduja, which left more than 40 people dead and any number still unaccounted for. According to the latest report of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council ( NDRRMC), damage to infrastructure was estimated at P1.08 billion while the agriculture sector posted more than P1 billion in losses.

Most of these deaths were caused by landslides. And open pit mining in the island of Biliran is being blamed for the landslides. Why is there a feast of mining operations in our land? Blame it on the laxity of government to control mining.

Consider this. Thrift- worthy Filipinos who have a bank deposit that earns an income have a fixed tax of 10 percent automatically withheld by the bank and remitted to the government.

On the other hand, a multibillion- peso mining firm, earning from the sale of extracted minerals, which rightfully belong to the Filipino people, will be remitting to the government a measly two percent excise tax.

How is that for equality and pro- people tax system?

Increase mining tax to mitigate disasters

Businesses engage in mining because they can realize windfall profits there. Let us reverse the situation. What if a sizable portion of their revenues will go to the government? Let the mining firms retain only two percent. Will they continue to mine? Of course, the straight answer is that they would not.

The average annual gross production value in mining, based on the last five years’ data, is estimated at P158 billion. The average annual excise tax paid to the government during the same period amounted to P2.5 billion. If we add just 10 percent to that, then the government would have collected P15 billion. See the difference?

On the extreme end, if the miners profit will be limited to only two percent, the estimated annual remittance to the national treasury shall be over P120 billion. This is really what the incumbent administration envisions to raise with the enactment of Republic Act 10963, or the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion ( TRAIN) law.

Did TRAIN impose additional taxes on these mined products? Well, yes, it would seem. Looking at Section 48 of the TRAIN law, it amended Section 151 of the National Internal Revenue Code ( NIRC) by adding another two percent on top of the existing two percent, making it only a measly four percent. This is one part of the NIRC that should have been carefully studied and examined. As it stands now, the miners will still be happy, some lawmakers will still be laughing all the way to the bank, and natural disasters will be made worst in the future.

As usual, some government of