[[Failed] Donate] Building rice farms in the Philippines Funding goal 0.2 BTC

[1miau]

Note: This campaign is cancelled because it's not any longer possible for our farmer to buy this part of land for his rice farm
Donators have been refunded.



While Bitcoin is quite useful for international transactions, it should be established as a medium to donate, where everyone can help people in need and send money easily. Donations are really great for such international transactions and here’s where I used it recently:

Last year in November, two Typhoons brought huge damages in Isabela, a province in the Philippines:







I’m knowing a rice farmer there and all local farms in his town were also affected, here some pictures few days later:





So, it started helping locally by sending him a few mBTC.

I send him a few mBTC to buy food and fresh water for himself and his town, while damages were repaired.
In a first batch, I send him 2 mBTC (around 40$):  






Originally posted here (German topic): Kleine Spendenkampagne BTC / Taifune in den Philippinen


Expand an existing farm

In addition, also in November, we tried to expand an existing farm, partially damaged by heavy rain and flood from typhoons. I made a public announcement in our German local section and set a limit of 10 mBTC to get it funded. A total of 22 mBTC was collected.

Rice seedlings were bought from a local supplier:





Rice seedlings were transported and planted later:





Work was finalized in November, farm is still growing.


Setting up a formerly used, but abandoned rice farm

After funding was a huge success, our farmer decided to started funding to set up a formerly used, but abandoned rice farm in December last year. It was announced here: [Ziel erreicht]Kleine Spendenkampagne BTC / Taifun in den Philippinen - Teil 2


Abandoned rice farm before it was renewed

Work included removing old plants and preparing it to plant new seedlings. To removed old plants and preparing it to farm rice again, machines were bought to do so. Due to heavy rain, it got a bit delayed and finally it was also a little bit more costly.

Finally, we collected almost 50 mBTC.

Removing old plants (farm wasn’t used for a long time):








Work was finished (birds liked it).




Two weeks later, a second step was done to remove growing stuff again before finally planting new seedlings:





And here a picture how it looked after removing part 2:






After work was done, our farmer waited to purchase seedlings again, but unfortunately all seedlings were bough by someone else and he decided to wait.
Meanwhile heavy rain started again:




It took some time to prepare it again and our farmer decided to plant rice seeds directly because it would take too long to wait for new rice seedlings:






Seeds were planted now and it didn’t take long to grow:






Now, we are waiting for it to grow but only few BTC is left.


New, international campaign

Now, we are planning to set up a new, even bigger farm. It is currently also abandoned but need to be purchased, too. After purchasing it, we are planning to prepare it and try to expand it (needs to be considered locally).
Preparing will include purchasing rice seedlings and planting.

We expect a total amount of 0.2 BTC to be sufficient here but we’ll watch out for difficulties (like last time when heavy rain gave us some extra expenses and a delay when we could buy rice seedlings.)


You can donate here: bc1qsqd6rlseaurd25uks0jvxjanuuz47x6pyuuyqd
(It's my address, I'll forward it to our farmer because he can only cash out 500$ per day.)

Note: This campaign is cancelled because it's not any longer possible for our farmer to buy this part of land for his rice farm
Donations will be refunded, but I'll send my 2mBTC to him anyways
Refunds will occur next weekend

Funding goal:  0.0024 / 0.200BTC  

Current balance:

USD value:


Progress will be updated constantly below and if you have any questions, feel free to reach out.  
If anyone wants to donate here, it would be really great to help building rice farms while using BTC to make it possible.

[1miau]

Reserved for updates


Donators so far:

_____________	_______________
1miau	2mBTC
SFR10	0.243mBTC
_____________	_______________
Total	0.000BTC

[Lucius]

I have one question regarding the price of land in the Philippines - specifically in this case the agricultural land that will be used for rice cultivation. I don't know exactly what the size of the land is, but 0.2 BTC is around $10 000 at the current price - so even though you included all the other costs, I was somehow convinced that agricultural land in that part of the world would be much cheaper.

In my country (EU), a large proportion of workers earn that much throughout the year - although there are those who earn perhaps only 60-70% of that amount.

[1miau]

I have one question regarding the price of land in the Philippines - specifically in this case the agricultural land that will be used for rice cultivation. I don't know exactly what the size of the land is, but 0.2 BTC is around $10 000 at the current price - so even though you included all the other costs, I was somehow convinced that agricultural land in that part of the world would be much cheaper.

Yes, it isn't cheap and I was also surprised when I heard about food prices. In general, it doesn't seem much lower than Europe here.

I asked him and it's around 5,000 square meters in total, so detailed costs are 2$ per square meter or let's say 1.50$ per square meter if we allocate 2.5k $ for preparing.
Compared to land, I would say it's still relatively cheap because where I'm from (Germany) land for farming can be very expensive but it depends where it's located.

I don't know if we can reach 10k here, maybe it's also possible to scale it down but it was based on my estimations from last round (we collected almost 0.1BTC in our German local board very quickly but BTC price was at 30k when we collected it).

[Lucius]

Yes, it isn't cheap and I was also surprised when I heard about food prices. In general, it doesn't seem much lower than Europe here.

I have to admit that the prices surprised me, especially after I found data on average salaries that are incomparably lower than the EU average - so a construction worker and a teacher earn about $370 a month, and a maintenance and cleaning crew only $166.

I don't know if we can reach 10k here, maybe it's also possible to scale it down but it was based on my estimations from last round (we collected almost 0.1BTC in our German local board very quickly but BTC price was at 30k when we collected it).

I believe that the situation has changed with this price increase, people see that the price is rising and there are stories that 1 BTC will be worth maybe a few hundred thousand $. There comes a time when every satoshi will be appreciated - but I hope the project will succeed, although it may take a little longer than it did before.

[SFR10]

If anyone wants to donate here, it would be really great to help building rice farms while using BTC to make it possible.

Here's a donation ^{[TX link]} to kickstart this campaign but credit goes to "monkgg ^{[I've used what monkgg sent me as a tip for being the first reviewer for his/her platform]}"...

<sup>- I did ask for "monkgg's permission" prior to passing it on to this campaign.
- Since there's no rush, I intentionally used a small fee so more would go towards this campaign but I did accelerate it using both ViaBTC and AntPool.</sup>

[Lorence.xD]

I have one question regarding the price of land in the Philippines - specifically in this case the agricultural land that will be used for rice cultivation. I don't know exactly what the size of the land is, but 0.2 BTC is around $10 000 at the current price - so even though you included all the other costs, I was somehow convinced that agricultural land in that part of the world would be much cheaper.

In my country (EU), a large proportion of workers earn that much throughout the year - although there are those who earn perhaps only 60-70% of that amount.

Most farmers in my country(Philippines) do not have their own land and most of them are part of a hacienda or ranch that is owned by the oligarchs. That money that hopefully gets donated might be able to help them pay their debts, buy seeds and buy their food. Filipino farmers are among the poorest in my country and there are only a few that gets lucky because those who asked for more are either killed or removed from the land, what I am saying is that they are always getting the short end of the stick.

[1miau]

If anyone wants to donate here, it would be really great to help building rice farms while using BTC to make it possible.

Here's a donation ^{[TX link]} to kickstart this campaign but credit goes to "monkgg ^{[I've used what monkgg sent me as a tip for being the first reviewer for his/her platform]}"...

<sup>- I did ask for "monkgg's permission" prior to passing it on to this campaign.
- Since there's no rush, I intentionally used a small fee so more would go towards this campaign but I did accelerate it using both ViaBTC and AntPool.</sup>

Many thanks for your donation, every amount is useful to start funding here. 
I'll include it in my OP.


And I've also an update from our last campaign (donations came from German local board) where we can see a nice progress. Seems like rice is growing very fast generally:

I have one question regarding the price of land in the Philippines - specifically in this case the agricultural land that will be used for rice cultivation. I don't know exactly what the size of the land is, but 0.2 BTC is around $10 000 at the current price - so even though you included all the other costs, I was somehow convinced that agricultural land in that part of the world would be much cheaper.

In my country (EU), a large proportion of workers earn that much throughout the year - although there are those who earn perhaps only 60-70% of that amount.

Most farmers in my country(Philippines) do not have their own land and most of them are part of a hacienda or ranch that is owned by the oligarchs. That money that hopefully gets donated might be able to help them pay their debts, buy seeds and buy their food. Filipino farmers are among the poorest in my country and there are only a few that gets lucky because those who asked for more are either killed or removed from the land, what I am saying is that they are always getting the short end of the stick.

Yes, he has said something similar, it's not easy for them and when typhoons / floods are occuring, it can bring a lot of damage. Their farm is located in Isabela, I don't know if there are local differences.

[Ucy]

I have one question regarding the price of land in the Philippines - specifically in this case the agricultural land that will be used for rice cultivation. I don't know exactly what the size of the land is, but 0.2 BTC is around $10 000 at the current price - so even though you included all the other costs, I was somehow convinced that agricultural land in that part of the world would be much cheaper.

In my country (EU), a large proportion of workers earn that much throughout the year - although there are those who earn perhaps only 60-70% of that amount.

Most farmers in my country(Philippines) do not have their own land and most of them are part of a hacienda or ranch that is owned by the oligarchs. That money that hopefully gets donated might be able to help them pay their debts, buy seeds and buy their food. Filipino farmers are among the poorest in my country and there are only a few that gets lucky because those who asked for more are either killed or removed from the land, what I am saying is that they are always getting the short end of the stick.

Farmers don't have to buy lands to farm.
How about renting lands? Or the farmers could organize and move into forest or "no man's land" to farm.
I sometimes wonder why farmers don't take that risk to cut cost. They could even build temporary homes there to live close to the farms.

[Theb]

Now, we are planning to set up a new, even bigger farm. It is currently also abandoned but need to be purchased, too. After purchasing it, we are planning to prepare it and try to expand it (needs to be considered locally).
Preparing will include purchasing rice seedlings and planting.

Hey there bro nice to see you helping some people in a developing country as they truly need help directly. Also if I may ask does the friend of yours in the Philippines know anything about the land grants being given for farmers there? Because if you want to save your money and spend it elsewhere your friend might want to try and apply for a land grant under the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).

Agricultural free patents are land grants awarded to natural-born Filipino citizens in actual occupation and cultivation for at least 30 years of alienable and disposable lands not more than 12 hectares, and have paid the corresponding real property taxes.

Basically the land grant is about occupying a disposable land for a certain period of time in which the transfer of ownership will happen just by fulfilling the occupation period. So if you want to maximize your money you might want to explore this option with the DENR besides land grants from what I know they have several other related benefits for farmers regarding special land use permits on which the farmer is allowed to farm freely without purchasing the land, I hope this helps you as even some citizens here in the Philippines don't know about these kinds of laws/benefits for them.

[orions.belt19]

I have one question regarding the price of land in the Philippines - specifically in this case the agricultural land that will be used for rice cultivation. I don't know exactly what the size of the land is, but 0.2 BTC is around $10 000 at the current price - so even though you included all the other costs, I was somehow convinced that agricultural land in that part of the world would be much cheaper.

In my country (EU), a large proportion of workers earn that much throughout the year - although there are those who earn perhaps only 60-70% of that amount.

Most farmers in my country(Philippines) do not have their own land and most of them are part of a hacienda or ranch that is owned by the oligarchs. That money that hopefully gets donated might be able to help them pay their debts, buy seeds and buy their food. Filipino farmers are among the poorest in my country and there are only a few that gets lucky because those who asked for more are either killed or removed from the land, what I am saying is that they are always getting the short end of the stick.

Farmers don't have to buy lands to farm.
How about renting lands? Or the farmers could organize and move into forest or "no man's land" to farm.
I sometimes wonder why farmers don't take that risk to cut cost. They could even build temporary homes there to live close to the farms.

Most of the farmers don't actually own the lands they farm on and the downside here is how little the profit they get as most of it goes to the owners. Probably about 60% of the profit goes to the owner, then 40% to the farmers... nah, that's too generous. In reality it's more likely 70-80/30-40% ratio. If you think I'm exaggerating, you can read up the _{Hacienda Luisita} fiasco which used to be hush hush for several years.

To farm on a "no man's land", that would most probably be considered as "squatting". They will most probably be driven away or even arrested. Most of the agricultural land left are at least owned by someone or the government. And yes, most farmers actually build their homes on the land where they farm. This becomes a conflict whenever the landowners decides to sell the farmland and the farmers loses not only their jobs but also their homes.

[Lorence.xD]

~

Farmers don't have to buy lands to farm.
How about renting lands? Or the farmers could organize and move into forest or "no man's land" to farm.
I sometimes wonder why farmers don't take that risk to cut cost. They could even build temporary homes there to live close to the farms.

Renting the lands causes them to not get any profits because their landlords will be demanding large amount of money to pay for their lease on the land. This is evident in my country with a lot of farmers doing farm works in someone's land just to have something to eat for the day. They can't afford the risk because most farmers are illiterate and most people that try to help them are either using them for someone's agenda or they are being exploited, and if they take the risk that means that they are laying their families life on the line, a lot of farmers have been killed because they want some changes in their way of life.

[Slow death]

getting land for agriculture Is something very complicated to achieve. in my country for example the land Is government property, people request the government and the government grants the land to the person and the person cannot sell the land, this is in my country's constitution. but unfortunately we all sell the land and because of that the rich end up buying all fertile land and then reselling the land for very high prices, something like $30,000 for a land of very small dimensions. the only way that farmers had to benefit from land was because they had been living on the land for more than 30 to 40 years and this allowed previous generations to pass on the land as an inheritance for future generations. but my country’s farmers are unable to do agriculture that can supply the entire market in my country.

the storms, cyclones and the bad political of my government has ended up creating more hunger in our society even though we have land to grow food

in asia the situation of agriculture is more evolved than africa, even family farming in asia is much more evolved than family farming in africa

[Kakmakr]

I think the whole thing comes down to trust....

What guarantee do we have that the bitcoin are actually going towards that project? Let me make an example and then you tell me if it is possible to do this or not.

Ok, let's say I take photo's of someone else's project or even just the land that are being worked by those people and I say that this is a project funded by the Bitcoin donations that are being donated on this forum. (Will that be possible?)

What proof can be given that our donations will go towards that project? ( I love the idea, because you are helping them to fish and you are not simply buying the fish for them) 
 

[mole0815]

What guarantee do we have that the bitcoin are actually going towards that project?

I am not involved but personally this statement is enough for me:

I’m knowing a rice farmer there and all local farms in his town were also affected...

Since I trust 1miau and assume that he (and his friend) is acting correctly, I joined the campaign some time ago. However, not here but in the German thread.

[1miau]

Now, we are planning to set up a new, even bigger farm. It is currently also abandoned but need to be purchased, too. After purchasing it, we are planning to prepare it and try to expand it (needs to be considered locally).
Preparing will include purchasing rice seedlings and planting.

Hey there bro nice to see you helping some people in a developing country as they truly need help directly. Also if I may ask does the friend of yours in the Philippines know anything about the land grants being given for farmers there? Because if you want to save your money and spend it elsewhere your friend might want to try and apply for a land grant under the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).

Agricultural free patents are land grants awarded to natural-born Filipino citizens in actual occupation and cultivation for at least 30 years of alienable and disposable lands not more than 12 hectares, and have paid the corresponding real property taxes.

I asked him and he said he knows about it but it's very hard to get, mostly only for big farmers.

I think the whole thing comes down to trust....

What guarantee do we have that the bitcoin are actually going towards that project? Let me make an example and then you tell me if it is possible to do this or not.

Ok, let's say I take photo's of someone else's project or even just the land that are being worked by those people and I say that this is a project funded by the Bitcoin donations that are being donated on this forum. (Will that be possible?)

What proof can be given that our donations will go towards that project? ( I love the idea, because you are helping them to fish and you are not simply buying the fish for them) 
 

At first, I had given him small amounts of my own BTC and I felt confident he used it for what he send me pictures from. It was a very small amount, when a typhoon hit his town and he purchased some food and water from it. Later, he send me pictures from his damaged farm and I gave him some more to build it back up. He always delievered pictures when I asked him.
So I was sure, it was legitly used and started a little donation campaign.
When it was successfully finished, I suggested him to set up an abandoned farm near his house, which was in background when he made pictures from his vegetables. It was land owned by his town.

He said how much it would cost and I agreed to make a second donation campaign for it, so it was actually my idea to start it. Pictures from it are included in the OP, so I can say for sure it is build while we are seeing the progress here.
Yes, all funds could be set aside for a different purpose while they would have build up the farm anyways. That is highly unlikely because it was my idea to select that specific part of land and this farm looks like it was abandoned for 2 years or more.

However, it is very unlikely to be a scam and I'm also transparent about funds being used. Personally, I would not scam for a few mBTC. 


But he told me today, the new part of land is unfortunately no longer up for sale because someone else bought it. He told me to cancel our campaign, so I'll do it, refund SFR10 for his donation (many thanks) and will send my 2 mBTC directly to his farm to use it for harvesting / miscellaneous expenses when his current rice can be harvested. 

[Theb]

~snip

I asked him and he said he knows about it but it's very hard to get, mostly only for big farmers.

I don't think that's true since if they are already "big farmers" then I don't think they are qualified to get land grants as this privilege is for people who can't buy their own lands.

Here are the requirements your friend need in order to apply for a land grant.

Talabis said the requirements for the application of agricultural free patents are as follows:
• Duly accomplished application form;
• Tax Declaration, Deed of Sale, Extra Judicial Settlement or Waiver of Rights;
• Certification from the Municipal Circuit or Regional Trial Court concerned that there is no pending land registration case involving the parcel being applied for;
• Approved Survey Plan with Technical Description or Form V37, if covered with isolated survey;
• Certification of status of land from the Land Registration Authority, if the municipality is under cadastral proceedings or if there is an old survey (Private and Original Survey);
• Certification that the land applied for is alienable and disposable; and
• Documentary stamp

It might look a lot and overwhelming since this are several legal documents needed by the farmer to get and he might need some assistance for him to obtain everything especially he needs to worry about the pandemic and all. But I think the reward of having a free land as well as cutting their cost on buying one is something that he needs to target in if you want to save money and all.

[Ucy]

~

Farmers don't have to buy lands to farm.
How about renting lands? Or the farmers could organize and move into forest or "no man's land" to farm.
I sometimes wonder why farmers don't take that risk to cut cost. They could even build temporary homes there to live close to the farms.

Renting the lands causes them to not get any profits because their landlords will be demanding large amount of money to pay for their lease on the land. This is evident in my country with a lot of farmers doing farm works in someone's land just to have something to eat for the day. They can't afford the risk because most farmers are illiterate and most people that try to help them are either using them for someone's agenda or they are being exploited, and if they take the risk that means that they are laying their families life on the line, a lot of farmers have been killed because they want some changes in their way of life.

How about just sharing part of the agric products with the land owners? If renting is a problem, maybe they could agree with the land owners to share 10-30% of what comes out of their farm.
I think lots of the landowners will wish the lands produce bountifully to have bountiful share of the farm produce.

[MRKLYE]

Looks like there is a shitload of bush adjacent to the land that could be cleared for way less than 0.2 BTC that could be converted into a rice patty.

[1miau]

~snip

I asked him and he said he knows about it but it's very hard to get, mostly only for big farmers.

I don't think that's true since if they are already "big farmers" then I don't think they are qualified to get land grants as this privilege is for people who can't buy their own lands.

He's not a big farmer as far as I know.

Looks like there is a shitload of bush adjacent to the land that could be cleared for way less than 0.2 BTC that could be converted into a rice patty.

I suggested that already a few weeks ago but he said, it is not owned by him and would also cost money to be purchased if it even can be purchased. I don't know if it's possible to be used for farming land.


Donation refunded as promised: https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/transaction/ac58e92ebfe815a5376a5c70aff33f14bd759f1e7b271b21efd9a8fc385f3739