<div class="image-full-width">
<img loading="lazy" src="https://cdn.kahimyang.com/resources-7/marcos-jarrin.webp"  alt="President Ferdinand Marcos"/>
<div>
(Marcos in 1985 greeted Genenral Mercado Jarrin, (ret.), head of Peru's Institute of Geostrategic and Political Studies, who was part of an EIR/Schiller Institute delegation to discuss a partial moratorium on foreign debt. On Mercado's left is then-Foreign Minister Pacifico Castro.)
</div>
</div>
<p>
But Marcos was not only concerned about "counterinsurgency" in declaring martial law. The Philippines
was still essentially a colonial economy. Productivity was low in both agriculture and industry. Marcos had set out from the beginning of his presidency to establish Philippine food self-sufficiency in rice and corn in a program known as Masagana 99. He focused on basic agricultural infrastructure, especially irrigation, in the major food-producing regions of Luzon and Mindanao. Credit facilities, mechanization, and the introduction of high-yield rice varieties resulted in the elimination of
rice imports by 1968.
</p>
<p>
In 1972, Marcos invited Chinese agriculturalists to visit the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), the world-famous institute located in Los Baños, Philippines, presenting the Chinese
with a bag of the high-yield rice developed there. This led to a close collaboration between the two countries on the development of high-yield seed, and in 1977 the brilliant Chinese agronomist Yuan Longping, known as the father of hybrid rice, came to Los Baños, beginning a collaboration that continues still today.
</p>
<p>
When Marcos imposed martial law in 1972, among his first acts was a proclamation that the entire nation was to be considered a "land reform area," and a declaration that all tenants working
land devoted primarily to rice and corn were to be the owners of that land, up to a specified limit.
Despite the enraged opposition of the oligarchy, the program proved to be extraordinarily successful. Coupled with the infrastructure and mechanization improvements, a quarter of a million peasants became landowners, and grain productivity increased by half.
</p>
<p>
Another major step after the declaration of martial law was to contract with Westinghouse
for the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant, which was to be the first (and would still today be the only) commercial nuclear power plant in Southeast Asia. When the U.S. deposed Marcos in 1986, the already completed plant was moth-balled, although the country was forced to pay every penny of the cost of construction and the inflated debt service, without ever producing a single watt of electricity.
</p>

<p>
In 1979, Marcos launched his plan for the industrialization of the Philippines. His "Eleven Major Industrial Projects" aimed at transforming the country from consumer goods production to basic heavy industry. It was in part modeled on the "Heavy-Chemical Industry Drive" launched by Park
Chung-Hee in South Korea in the 1970s, which successfully transformed that country into
the leading industrial power, a "first world" nation, that it is today.
</p>
<div class="image-full-width">
<img loading="lazy" src="https://cdn.kahimyang.com/resources-7/bnpp.webp" alt="Bataan Nuclear Power Plant" />
<div>
(The moth-balled Bataan Nuclear Power Plant)
</div>
</div>
<p>
The Marcos plan included:
</p>
<p>
<ol>
<li>
A copper smelter, a joint project with Japan's Marubeni, to go into operation by
1983
</li>
<li>
Phosphate fertilizer production, using the sulfuric acid waste from the copper smelter, with international support from the U.S., Japan, Germany, U.K., Belgium and Spain, also to go online in 1983
</li>
<li>
An aluminum smelter, a 50/50 venture with U.S. Reynolds Metals, to open by 1984
</li>
<li>
A diesel engine manufacturing plant, in joint ventures with Japan and Germany, scheduled for production by 1982
</li>
<li>
Cement industry expansion, converting existing plants from imported oil to coal, to go online in 1984
</li>
<li>
Coconut industry production of commercial alcohol for detergents, to open in 1982
</li>
<li>
Pulp and paper industry expansion—the Philippines had the only newsprint plant
in Southeast Asia at the time
</li>
<li>
Petrochemical complex, to be built near the Bataan nuclear plant, with help from the U.S.
and Taiwan, aiming for a 1983 production start
</li>
<li>
Heavy engineering industries, with Germany, to produce the machine tools and parts for the large industrial plants in the plan
</li>
<li>
Integrated steel mill, with Austria, to open in 1985
</li>
<li>
Alcogas, a project to make alcohol to produce fuel with 20% alcohol, 80% gasoline for running motor vehicles.
</li>
</ol>
<p>
Marcos described the intention of his "Philippine Development Plan" as fundamentally aimed at providing social justice to the poor. He wrote:
</p>
<div class="article-comment">
<p>
At the heart of these Plans is the concern for social justice. The preparation of these plans has been guided by one objective: No Filipino shall be without sustenance.
</p>
<p>
We have therefore set our Development Plans toward a direct and purposeful attack
against poverty by focusing on the poorest of our society, planning to meet their basic nutritional needs; reducing if not entirely eliminating illiteracy; expanding employment opportunities; improving access to better social services; equalizing opportunities; sharing the fruits of development equitably; and introducing the requisite institutional changes. We will pursue economic development for social justice.
</p>
</div>
<p>
In this regard, he wrote in his 1980 book, An Ideology for Filipinos:
</p>
<div class="article-comment">
<p>
Indeed, we may say that the new name for social justice is development. For their ideals and objectives are - may well be in the final analysis - the real objectives of the Development Plans we
have drafted. And, we are proud to say, these are perhaps the only plans for national development
that have been prepared with the ends of social justice in mind. It is this fusion of social justice
and economic development that I feel is our own significant contribution to the social justice
tradition I have outlined.
</p>
</div>


<p>
<strong>Sources</strong>: 
</p>
<ol class="article-sources">
<li>
This is extracted from a larger artitle "Operation Marcos: A Development Plan for Asia and the World", Volume 46, Number 23, June 14, 2019,  <a href="https://larouchepub.com/eiw/public/2019/eirv46n23-20190614/index.html" class="news_link" title="Source" target="_blank" >Michael Billington</a>, Executive Intelligence Review.  
</li>
</ol>




The Marcos record: The new name for social justice is Development