"An Englishman with an Ilonggo's Heart"

The Father of the Philippine Sugar Industry is a British  named Nicholas Loney , who was born in Plymouth, England. He did not receive much formal schooling , as his family was far from well-off.His      father was a lieutenant in the Royal Navy who was able to raise  ten children despite of his frequent absence from home. Loney made up for his lack of education through his readings.

At the age of 16, he left home and went to Venezuela where he learned to speak Spanish .He traveled further to New Zealand ,Australia and Singapore. There, he heard of Manila and applied at Ker and Co. for work in their Manila office. He stayed at Ker @ Co. correspondence department for four years, then he resigned to return to England, but before departure, he was nominated as Vice Consul for Iloilo on September 29, 1855.

The challenge of promoting trade in "forgotten dot of the universe"that he called Iloilo, probably appealed greatly to him. He spent 12 years of his life in Iloilo. He developed a waterfront from a swampland. He built the first stone warehouse to hold the huge stores of sugar to be shipped to Manila and later for export to British market. He built a road leading from the interior town of Iloilo to the port.. He called the road Calle Progreso. 

When Loney arrived in Iloilo, farmers were still using the old wooden plows. He became the first businessman in the Visayas to offer farm equipment to farmers at installment basis and at low cost. He sold mills supplied to him by British firm,which were operated with the use of carabao or an ox, and another run by steam, using bagasse and wood for fuel. In 1861 ,there were 30 iron mills in Iloilo and one in Antique.

Loney introduced better varieties of sugarcane imported from East Indies. He offered crop loans at almost give -away interest and cash advance  to farmers in Iloilo and Negros , without collateral, 

promissory notes or receipts . All his accounts were listed in one notebook. He redesigned the lorcha, the boat that carry loads between Panay and Negros based on the lines of Brixham trawler, to be able to carry heavier loads of sugar. He even put up a shipyard in Guimaras for building lorchas.

Loney opened the sugar trade from Iloilo to Australia. He was tireless in seeking development not only of sugar trade but of the entire country.He conceived of a telegraph line to be laid by the British government and presented before the Madrid authorities  the opening of a railway line in Luzon from Manila to the port of Sual and an interisland steamer line between Manila, Iloilo and Cebu.

Through the British firm R @J Henderson, Loney brought about the first direct foreign trade in Cebu and direct importation from Europe to Iloilo of sugar mill machinery and coal on a ship.He established the Hacienda Matabang in Negros. 

Loney settled in Iloilo with his wife, Leontine Trashler, a Spanish -French teacher he met in Madrid. They had two children. In 1866, he became the British Consul in the Philippines. In1869, he climbed Mount Kanlaon with a few friends, but caught malaria before reaching the peak. He died at the age of 43 in Iloilo.

Today, a bronze statue stands on the Iloilo waterfront.It is a memorial to the "Father of Philippine Sugar Trade." The first memorial, a marble obelisk with inscriptions in Ilonggo, Spanish, English and French had raised after his death in 1869. It was destroyed after the war, bulldozed in the process of expanding the street.For many years, the only memorial to Loney was the waterfront in Iloilo City and a street named after him in Silay City.

In March, 1981, a life-size bronze statue was unveiled at the "Muelle Loney"by the British Ambassador to the Philippines,William Bently and Philippine Sugar Commission Chairman Roberto S. Benedicto, who donated the site in the waterfront. The memorial was funded by former British Ambassador to the Philippines, Turpin , and Addis , British and Filipino companies as well as private individuals.The sculptor who made the statue was Leonides  S. Valdes, a well -known sculptor who studied bronze and marble sculpture and chemistry and metallurgy at the Instituto de Bellas Artes in Florence. 

The statue faces the waterfront.The right hand clutches a pocket bible , indicative of a stern, religious character of a man who got things done and done well. Nicholas Loney was described by Gov. Conrado Norada as a "Britisher with an Ilonggo's Heart". Ambassador R.S.B. said of Loney, "The Spaniards could have done it if they wanted to, but it took a Britisher  to give the direction." 

The solid foundation of sugar industry that for 150 years was the mainstay of the country's foreign trade came from Loney. He could have become one of Iloilo's richest tycoons but he did not put the love of money among his priorities. In a tradition of boundless gratitude, Gov, Norada spoke for generations of Ilonggos, "In our hearts, we shall forever keep him our friend".