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PRODUCTION in the country’s farm sector grew by 4
percent from January to March, faster than the
3.3-percent growth posted in the same period last year,
on the back of higher crop production, the Department of
Agriculture (DA) said.
Palay
production, however, posted only a minimal growth of
1.96 percent to 3.748 million metric tons (MMT) during
the period.
The
farm-sector growth was buoyed largely by corn
production, which grew by almost 17 percent to 1.99 MMT,
and banana production, with a 20.6-percent increase to
1.92 MMT.
“There
was just a delay in the harvest of palay in some
rice-producing areas because of the cold spell, but we
think the additional harvests will come in during the
second quarter,” said Agriculture Secretary Arthur C.
Yap in a press briefing in Quezon City on Tuesday.
Yap
reiterated earlier assurances he gave, that the
Philippines is on track in producing 7.1 MMT of palay in
January to June this year.
“The
summer harvest is not yet done, but I believe it’s
strong, it’s robust and it’s going to be more than 7 MMT,”
he said.
The DA
also said it is targeting to produce more than 10 MMT of
palay during the main harvest in the last quarter of the
year.
“With
continuous rains, a lot of rainfed areas can now be
utilized. For the wet cropping season, 2.54 million
hectares of rice lands have been programmed for planting
with good certified seeds and hybrid rice seeds,” said
Yap.
The DA
repeated assurances that the country will have enough
rice stocks to last until the lean months of June, July,
and August, since the “10- percent supply gap” has
already been covered by importations by its attached
agency, the National Food Authority (NFA).
As to
whether it will import during the lean months to beef up
its buffer stock as it had earlier pronounced,
Yap said the
Philippines “will only go back to the (international
rice) market when the situation is already favorable.”
With
expectations of good corn and palay harvest in the
second quarter, the DA expects second- semester farm
growth to be “40 percent higher in terms of value at
constant prices” than the 3.19 percent it posted in
January to June last year.
For the
first quarter, the crops subsector remained as the main
contributor to farm production, accounting for almost 50
percent of farm production.
Deviating from the usual trend, the crops subsector
propelled farm growth during the period instead of the
fisheries subsector, which grew by only 4.41 percent as
production from municipal fisheries declined by 2
percent.
“Production of municipal fisheries retreated because of
the prolonged cold spell in areas like Region IV-B and
Palawan,” said Yap.
The
livestock and poultry subsector was the laggard among
all subsectors, with production declining by 3.36
percent due to a 4.19-percent decline in hog production.
The DA
traced this to the contraction in supply mostly in
Luzon, where hogs were stricken by a number of diseases
such as porcine diarrhea and hog cholera last year. |
