Rice Watch Action Network, Inc.. (R1)

• R1 traces its birth back to early 2000 at a critical time in Philippine agriculture. At that time, there was a strong move to liberalize the rice industry but then the promised gains in trade and market access openings for Philippine agricultural exports were also not being realized. Hence, a strong and a successful campaigning from the civil society allowed continued protection for our staple in view of the liberalization policy pitfalls and the very obvious fact that our rice farmers will not survive competition at that time. Among those who campaigned hard were a group of NGOs, about 12 of the long-established organizations were the same ones that gave birth to Rice Watch and Action Network otherwise known as R1 in April 2004. The call to organize officially as a network was made realizing that trade campaigning was very tactical and that there was a need to continue on the fight and pursue a more strategic, sustainable development for the Philippine rice sector. R1 became a constant figure in national policy engagements in the Department of Agriculture—taking on trade issues, food and rice productivity program analysis, sustainable agriculture, technology issues and in recent years, the issues of budget, program implementation tracking at the ground level and our work on disaster preparedness and climate change. Early on, we were also doing international advocacies on trade and were on occasions made part of the official Philippine delegation to the WTO Ministerial meetings abroad. We headed and convened CSO meetings and lobby missions to the Group of 33 (developing) countries in the WTO to pursue common advocacies on trade. Over the years, our advocacies also became more complexed and tended to focus more on the productivity of the farmer, pursuing sustainable and integrated area development, climate change policies,engaging local governments and specific communities in CCA planning, building community models