Lumbangan, Nasugbu, Batangas: Historical Data Part III
 |
| Historical data from the National Library of the Philippines. |
PART III
PART I | PART II | PART III | PART IV | PART V
[p. 14]
nor expense to make it so. Innumerable instances may be cited in support of this assertion, a recitation of a few of those will suffice: in [the] process of installation of an 8" C.E.P.I. For the electro-magnetical, anti-calcareous treatment of boiler water for the locomotives and factory boilers. The CEPI apparatus is electrically operated at 110 volts and 97 amperes.
For the first time, this current milling season, a new apparatus is going to be used, similar to the CEPI anti-calcareous apparatus, type VE, 110 volts and 97 amperes, and operates on an electro-magnetical breakage of mineral salts that cost incrustations in the tubes. As claimed by the manufacturer, S.A. Epuro of Belgium, this apparatus prevents scale deposits on heaters and evaporators. The apparatus has been installed between the heater pumps and the juice heaters.
Another improvement recently introduced for use during the current milling season is a double-swing High Speed Exact-Weight sacking scale to be used in bagging export sugar. For drying export sugar, a vertical sugar dryer, locally made onsite, is used. It is fed on top by the elevators and a continuous blast of steam heated air he is forced at the bottom, an exhaust fan relieves the dryer of moist air at the top into an air duct. The vertical dryer shell is made of H. S. plates, 16 ft. high and 50" in diameter provided inside with 11 horizontal revolving trays and 11 conical buffalo compartments. This dryer was made in the central in 1947.
For washed sugar drying, a horizontal revolving Hersey Hot Air Sugar Dryer was installed in 1950, motor-driven, 2,000 piculs
[p. 15]
capacity in 24 hours; main shell is 4 ft. in diameter and 26 ft. long. Below the vertical dryer is a sugar bin equipped with an automatic weighter at the outlet. Sugar from both dryers are finally with on Toledo Platform scales.
Two units of cane scales are in use by the central: I-Streeter-Amet new track scales and automatic weighing recorder, 20 ton capacity, hand lever operated, installed in 1949; card and pink print 2/22" [unsure, blurred] type-wheel and dial indicator, provided with hydromatic control; used for gross weighing of cane cars and trucks; and 1 Howe track scale, with recording beam and ticket stamping device on rider. Capacity, 10 tons, manually operated, used for tare weighing of empty cane cars and trucks.
The central owns and operates 180.3 kilometers of railway networks in the four towns of Tuy, Balayan, Lian and Nasugbu, all in Batangas Province, with several wooden and all-steel bridges. Railroad lines are all 60 cm. gauge, using 30 lbs. per yard rails. There are eight steam locomotives, all Henchel, of different tonnages, cool or bunker fuel burning and seven Plymouth locomotives, gasoline or diesel operated, of different tonnages. Cane and sugar rail cars consist of 20 sugar boxcars (NBs), of 10 tons each; 400 cane open cars, all steel, of 3 tons each, and 820 cane open cars, all steel, of 4 tons each.
The central also owns and operates 9 cargo trucks and five truck-trailers for alcohol, sugar and general supplies haulage to and from Manila. These are used also for cane hauling
[p. 16]
during the milling season; aside from these, the central hires more than 100 private trucks during the milling season to haul cane to the central from places not connected by railroad.
The central maintains a complete machine and general repair shop, a spare parts and supply storehouse, a locomotive barn and shop, and a complete sugar laboratory in the factory premises.
The alcohol distillery attached to the central has a capacity of 4,000 gallons of alcohol per day, using two units of Barbet distilling columns.
The planters adhered to the central number 1,500, aside from about 100 emergency planters who are served and accommodated at the mill. The total quota of adhered planters aggregate 740,001 piculs, while the quota of the hacienda belonging to the central amounts to 4,595 piculs based on the 1951-1952 crop. The current crop is estimated at 864,500 piculs compared to 707,010 piculs for the preceding crop.
The money value of the 1950-1951 crop, aggregated to 556,200 piculs export sugar at an average price of ₱14.50 per picul (₱7,000,000) and 169,000 piculs domestic sugar at ₱16.00 per picul (₱2,7000,000), aggregates ₱10,500,000.00, while that for the 1951-1952 crop at the same average prices is estimated at ₱15,000,000.00.
The central employs about 1,100 laborers in the mill and in the field with an annual payroll of ₱1,400,000.00 for the 1950-1951 crop.
Sugar crop-sharing between the planters and the mill under the old contract for the districts of Balayan, Tuy, Lian and Nasugbu
[p. 17]
(which are being served by railroad and trucks) was 55-45 and for other districts served only by trucks, 50-50. Under the new contract, effective since 1950-1951 when production of 700,000 piculs was reached, planters who have signed up receive 60 per cent share. The additional share of 5 to 10 per cent in favor of the planters north approximately half a million pesos for that year alone. Up to September 21, 1951, 684 planters, who represent about 670,000 piculs effecting 1,500 Plantation Audits, have already signed the new contract. The same sharing arrangements holds in the case of molasses produced by the mill.
In common with the practice in other sugar centrals, the Don Pedro Central gives excellent facilities to its employees and laborers. There are 19 large houses and one club house having all the conveniences and comfort of home for its employees, while those for the laborers consist of 55 duplex apartments, 12 newly-built single apartments, one club house, one large apartment for 12 families and two Quonset huts for 14 families each.
Besides these houses, the employers and laborers are given free light, water, and ample lot for flower or vegetable garden or poultry raising. However, free transportation by special train is given to most laborers who live near the central or in Nasugbu town proper. The Don Pedro Athletic Society, which has been formed among the central and distillery employees and laborers, has been receiving the support and monetary aid of the central in the former’s recreational activities, such as basketball, tennis, softball, etc., the grounds and court for which have been provided by the central. The central
[p. 18]
owns two movie projectors which are used every Thursday for the showing of moving pictures films rented and brought from Manila to Nasugbu for the entertainment of the employees and laborers and their families at no cost at all.
In order to help fill the spiritual needs of the people in the central community, a Catholic chapel has been established and maintained in the mill premises.
The central likewise has donated the land for the sites of the Lumbangan Elementary School as well as those for other various schools in Nasugbu.
A large two-story concrete hospital building is now completed and is now in operation. It cost the central about ₱150,000.00. This was built for the benefit of the employees and laborers and their families. The hospital will be completely equipped with all the modern conveniences and facilities available in other institutions of the kind.
The central acts as agent for the Sugar Planters’ Cooperative Association which pools the planters’ sugar for export to the United States. The central also imports and advances the cost of fertilizers for distribution to the planters at cost. Planters may obtain crop loans from the central at a nominal rate of interest.
It is estimated that about 100,000 people depend on the sugar industry in Batangas, computed on the basis of four dependents for each of the planters, tenants, officials, employees and laborers connected with the Central Azucarera Don Pedro.
[p. 19]
Miller-planter relations in the Don Pedro Central have been maintained on a high level of mutual trust and close cooperation. Due appreciation on the part of both the planters and the central of the indispensability of each other’s services has been profitable to the common endeavor for greater accomplishments in the field and in the factory. That the planters have an abiding faith and confidence in the mill may be mentioned, as an example, the non-employment of a planter’s association chemist. This, however, does not suggest even remotely that the planter’s associations which do employ their own chemists to check on [the] central’s operations and laboratory reports, lack confidence in mill management; in the Don Pedro Central, it simply means the planter’s association there has found it a necessary to employ its own chemist for obvious reasons, which [in] fact incidentally spells savings for the planters.
Many, if not most, of our people whose interest has been confined to many things except the economic affairs of our country, have not fully appreciated the accomplishments and the financial support to the government of our wealth-producing industries. Taking the monetary contribution off the Don Pedro Central alone, many of our countrymen will be surprised to learn that the taxes derived by our government from that source alone for the crop year 1950-1951 aggregated ₱5,155,738.23. These taxes consists of the percentage tax on sugar of the mill and the planters, wharfage tax, assessment tax, sugar adjustment tax (basic), municipal license, professional licenses, auto and truck licenses, income tax, distillery taxes, specific tax on alcohol as paid by the central and the buyers which by the way amounts to ₱4,440,000.00, and the new exchange tax which significantly amounts to ₱125,803.03.
[p. 20]
In the nationwide survey of tourist attractions and facilities in the Philippines, the cooperation of sugar centrals and sugarcane planters may be had for the asking and for a long range objective: the further commercial and industrial development of the Philippines. A visit to sugar mills and sugarcane haciendas will serve the purpose of enlightening local and foreign visitors and investors on miller-planter-laborer relations and other economic and social conditions obtaining in the mill districts.
Full utilization of several by-products of the sugar industry awaits local and foreign capital and sugar centrals, it is believed, would not be unwilling to cooperate with government and private organizations in helping investors to have first hand information on the possibilities of joint or independent efforts towards this end.
SOME FACTS ABOUT THE CENTRAL DON PEDRO
1. The molasses storage tanks situated behind the sugar factory has a total of 1,670,000 U.S. gallons.
2. The alcohol distillery has a capacity of 4,000 gallons of alcohol per day, using two units of Berbet distilling columns.
3. The cost of reconstruction and additional investments in the central after the war to date is placed at ₱4,500,000.00.
4. The present daily capacity of the central is 2,900 of cane. This will be increased to 3,500 tons in 1952-1953 milling.
5. The two smoke stacks of the mill is each less 165 ft. from the ground.
6. The new two-story concrete hospital building of the sugar central has an estimated cost of ₱150,000.00.
For purposes of comparison of the production of the Central Don Pedro with the other sugar centrals in the Philippines, the following data is here with published. These data are based on the 1950-1951 sugar productions in Central Luzon and several Visayan Islands where sugar centrals are found.
PART I | PART II | PART III | PART IV | PART V