The popular and peasant
organizations of El Salvador
have always advocated land
reform. Increasingly, over the
past 20 years, the peasants have
given their lives in the struggle
for modest social and economic
improvements in the country-
side. Why, then, have these
groups condemned an agrarian
reform that is sopken of as the
“most far-reaching reform in
36
Latin America”? The answer lies
in the brief history of El
Salvador’s agrarian reform.
Background to Reform
El Salvador urgently needs a
profound agrarian reform. The
historic monopolization of land
resources in the country has
created a situation in which 50%
of the rural population are
unemployed for eight months of
every year and more than 7 0% of
all rural children suffer from
chronic malnutrition.
Furthermore, as large estates
steadily encroached on small
farmers and campesinos during
the past 20 years, the number of
landless skyrocketed. This situa-
tion further deteriorated with the
arrival of modern agribusiness
companies.
As modern agricultural firms
have forced thousands of peas-
ants off the land, they have not
been able to find employment in
the cities; for El Salvador’s in-
dustrial growth has depended on
labor-saving machinery supplied
by multinational corporations.
Thus, employment in the manufac-
turing sector grew only 6% from
1961 to 1971 while manufacturing
activities increased by 24%.
Despite this growth, El Salvador
remains a predominantly agrarian
country dependent on export
crops which make up approx-
imetnlv 7. n of the total v;lup, of
AGRARIAN REFORM
Hope Turns to Terror
its exports and absorb more than
50 % of the workforce. Reform of
the nation’s agricultural sector,
therefore, is critical for improving
the general health of the economy
and, above all, for laying the foun-
dation for a just distribution of
social wealth.
Reform to Repression
On October 15, 1979, after
ousting the regime of General
Carlos Romero, a group of young
military officers led by Col. Adolfo
Majano pledged their firm commit-
ment to agrarian reform. Yet the
peasants’ hopes and expectations
turned to skepticism and disap-
pointment when government
Leaders took few concrete
measures to implement the
reform.
NACLA Reportupdate update.update.update
To the contrary, state security
forces unleashed an unprece-
dented wave of terror against the
popular organizations and their
followers, particularly the’ peasant-
ry who, according to Church
reports, had been singled out for
especially harsh treatment. This
attack provoked the March 1980
resignation of the truly moderate
members of the Junta.
In view of the marked shift to
the right by the Junta and this
unrelenting assault against the
peasants, the government’s an-
nouncement of the Basic Agrarian
Reform Law in early March came
as quite a surprise. The shock,
however, was to be short-lived.
Phase I: The Large
Estates
On March 7, the government
announced the first phase of the
agrarian reform, Decree 154,
which authorized the expropriation
of estates 500 hectares and larger
(1 hectare = 2.47 acres) and the
formation of cooperative peasant
associations.
At first blush, such a program
seemed to be a very radical attack
on the agrarian oligarchy. Yet the
reality of the situation was dif-
ferent. In the first place, coffee,
the basis of El Salvador’s rural
oligarchy, is typically grown on
relatively small plots. Secondly,
coffee magnates had subdivided
their estates among family
members since 1971 in anticipa-
tion of the demand for reform.
Thus, estimates are that only
2-15% of coffee estates were af-
fected by Phase I reforms.
In addition, those estates 500
hectares and larger make up only
about 15% of El Salvador’s arable
land. While it is often claimed that
these estates encompass El
Salvador’s best farmland, this is
only partially true. More than 60%
of the land affected by Phase I is
either pasture, forest or mountains
-some of El Salvador’s most un-
productive land. Thus, one has to
be careful about accepting a pic-
ture of deep economic change
caused by Phase I reforms.
In addition, Phase I was de-
signed and implemented without
the participation of peasants,
popular organizations, the Church
or academics-precisely the
groups which had a strong com-
mitment to agrarian reform and
the expertise necessary to carry it
out.
At this stage of the process,
U.S. involvement appears to have
been limited. U.S. advisers
basically saw agrarian reform as a
device for winning the peasantry
away from the popular organiza-
tions. As government officials
have acknowledged, the timing
and motivation for the agrarian
reform were eminently political.
Simultaneous with the Basic
Agrarian Reform Law, the Junta
declared a countrywide state of
siege. Claiming that this was
necessary to protect peasants
from landlord retribution, the
government actually authorized
the militarization of the country-
side.
Not surprisingly, the peasants
reacted with fear and distrust
when the military first appeared.
Many fled and hid in the fields. Five
hundred agricultural technicians
from the Salvadorean Institute of
Agrarian Transformation (ISTA)
were dispatched to inform the
peasants of the reform process
and to organize them into
cooperatives. But this aspect of
the reform, as well as all the
others, excluded peasants from
the planning stages. Further, those
social sectors closest to the
owners were able to dominate
these cooperatives.
To understand how this was
possible, we must look at the two
socio-economic sectors that work
on the large estates: salaried
employees and permanent resi-
dent laborers (colonos). The
salaried employees-administrat-
ors, bookkeepers, mechanics,
etc.-maintain close ties with
paramilitary organizations and the
National Guard. Colonos, on the
other hand, have been kept in a
state of submission. They have
been prevented from joining the
popular peasant organizations and
are often characterized as the
sector of the peasantry with the
lowest level of social and political
consciousness. It therefore is not
surprising that administrators and
other salaried employees
dominate many of the newly
formed peasant cooperatives.
More than 10 months after the
reform, the colonos continue to
live in extreme poverty with no
control over their own destiny. For
this reason, we must question
sources which claim that 60,000
families have benefitted from
Phase I.
Ignoring the Landless
To understand the real nature of
the reform process, one has to
look at the question of benefits.
Landless rural workers (60% of
the rural population who neither
rent, sharecrop or own) have been
entirely excluded from the
agrarian reform at a moment
when the rural proletariat is ex-
panding faster than any other
group in the countryside. Thus, we
encounter the absurdity of an
agrarian reform process that ig-
JanlFeb 1981 37update update update update
nores the landless.
If the reform doesn’t benefit the
landless, it often isn’t much better
for the newly formed cooperatives.
Landlords, operating through
paramilitary organizations and the
National Guard, sabotaged the
machinery and moveable assets
of many cooperatives. More than
30% of their cattle were
slaughtered. Thus, scores of newly
formed cooperatives were left with
little but empty pastureland. Fur-
thermore, landlords bribed military
officials in order to get their farms
returned, and were successful in
many cases. Finally, security
forces either killed or set to flight
peasants and/or ISTA technicians
who resisted.
By the end of March 1980, the
first month of the reform process,
it was clear that security forces
had escalated their assault against
the popular organizations. In that
month alone, they killed more than
twice as many people as they had
in February. Of the dead, more
than 50% were peasants-the
supposed beneficiaries of agrarian
reform. This glaring fact provoked
the late Archbishop Oscar Romero
to declare: “Reforms which re-
quire the blood of the people are
invalid.”
Phase II: The Heart of
the Reform
Whereas the first phase of the
agrarian reform process author-
ized the expropriation of estates
larger than 500 hectares, Phase II
targeted all estates between 150
and 500 hectares. In other words,
Phase II hit directly at most of the
wealthy coffee estates-the
economic stronghold of the oligar-
chy. Phase II reforms would en-
compass more than 25% of the
good farm land (1800 farms) as
opposed to 15% (250 farms) af-
fected by Phase I. Undoubtedly,
Phase II is at the heart of the
agrarian reform process.
Yet nothing has been done on
Phase II. No enforcing laws have
been passed; no cooperatives
have been formed; no farms have
been expropriated. And there is
good reason to believe that Phase
II will never be implemented and
the economic base of the oligar-
chy never threatened. Indeed, to
carry out Phase II is to alienate the
oligarchy and its military sup-
porters, and the Junta has thus far
shown little desire to move in this
direction. By not implementing this
program, the government clearly
demonstrates that its interest in
agrarian reform is predicated on
political expediency rather than a
genuine commitment to far-
reaching social and economic
change.
Phase III: “Land to the
Tiller”
The “reform” process did not
end with Phase II. On April 28,
1980, the Junta announced
Decree 207. This so-called “Land-
to-the-Tiller” program came as a
surprise to everyone except the
group of U.S. “experts” who
designed and imposed it on El
Salvador’s government. The pro-
gram was drafted by the
AFL-CIO’s American Institute for
Free Labor Development (AIFLD)
with the consultation of Roy Pros-
terman. A University of
Washington law professor, Pros-
terman had authored a similar pro-
gram in Vietnam as a part of the in-
famous Operation Phoenix.
The Land-to-the-Tiller program
is designed to create “owners”
out of all current tenants, providing
their plot or plots do not surpass
seven hectares. No more renting
of land will be permitted. The new
“owner” can stay on the land for
30 years, but cannot sell or
transfer it.
In theory, the program appears
simple and highly beneficial. But
its consequences are disastrous.
First, it institutionalizes and
reproduces extremely small farms
(minifundia). Second, it will lead to
serious over-use of the land, trig-
gering accelerating rates of ero-
sion. Third, it will provoke a greater
need for inputs from agribusiness
concerns, such as fertilizer.
Fourth, it creates an impossible
credit snarl: how do you get credit
to 150,000 disparate small
holders? Finally, it will lead to an
avalanche of litigation.
These negative consequences
stem from the manifest ignorance
of El Salvador demonstrated by
the program’s U.S. planners and
its architect, Roy Prosterman.
Simply put, small renters rotate
plots of land from one year to
another; seldom does anyone
cultivate the same plot of land
more than three years in succes-
sion. The objective behind this
practice is to minimize soil erosion
and falling yields of basic grains.
Given the very poor soil on which
most small-scale renting occurs,
overutilization would create a total-
ly sterile soil.
But that is exactly the effect of
the Land-to-the-Tiller program.
Since the renting of plots will be
prohibited, the program locks poor
peasants onto one very small plot
of land for 30 years, thus freezing
their system of plot rotation.
Because they cannot afford to let
their land lie fallow, the soil will
quickly become useless.
Moreover, Land to the Tiller is
built upon the supposed
NACLA Report 38update * update * update * update
desireability of fostering petty
capitalist ownership among
peasants. But, because of land
use, population density and provi-
sion of credit, this model is com-
pletely inappropriate for El
Salvador. Once again, the ra-
tionale behind the program is
political, not economic: the goal is
creation of a sector of privileged
peasants who will disassociate
themselves from the popular
organizations and fully support the
Junta.
Peasants flee from random torture or
murder by ORDEN members.
Beneficiaries or
Refugees?
Yet, even on its own terms, the
program is an abysmal failure.
Although many U.S. news reports
make bold claims about the
number of beneficiaries in the
Land-to-the-Tiller program, the fact
remains that there are none. No
one has received title to land
under this program. Instead, the
areas of Chalatenango, Cuscatlin
and Morazin-the areas of great-
est concentration of small
renters-have been turned into a
nightmarish wasteland because of
the ceaseless attacks of military
and security forces. Thousands of
potential “beneficiaries” have
been turned into refugees. The
violence in areas most acutely af-
fected by Land to the Tiller is un-
paralleled. Groups of National
Guard troops accompanied by
ORDEN peasants (ORDEN is a
paramilitary network of spies, in-
formers and enforcers, see Report
on the Americas, Vol. 14, No. 2) have seized the land of peasant
refugees.
JanlFeb 1981
El Salvador’s agrarian reform
has been accompanied by an un-
precedented level of violence. It
has exacerbated the problems of
landless rural proletarians. It has
been characterized by poor plan-
ning, political expediency and the
complete absence of peasant par-
ticipation. The result: El Salvador
remains in dire need of radical
agrarian reform which must be
built on the full and open participa-
tion of all peasant organizations
and political groups in that nation.
Without that participation, the pro-
duct at best is a coarse form of
paternalistic manipulation. At
worst, it is a program which, like
the current one, aims at the
destruction of independent peas-
ant organizations.
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