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A
DECADES-OLD policy bias against agriculture is a major
cause of the looming food shortage, according to Sen.
Edgardo Angara.
In a
statement over the weekend,
Angara blamed the government’s long-term neglect of agriculture for
the slow growth of this vital food sector as a result of
which, he said, “we are now seeing the serious
consequence of a lack of focus on agriculture in light
of the growing food crisis.”
Angara,
who briefly served as agriculture secretary under the
Estrada administration, admitted that “our policy has
been biased against those who toil the soil, and always
in favor of urban consumers. Our underinvestment in
agriculture is what rendered production to be unable to
meet demand, making food less available.”
He
suggested going “back to basics” to avert plunging the
country into a spiral toward deeper poverty.
“We have
to go back to agriculture,” Angara asserted, as he
outlined recommendations to solve the rice crisis,
including increased government investments in irrigation
and postharvest, improvement in seeds, credit to
farmers, incentives to local governments, and investment
in technology and research and development.
Noting that the government spends at least P66 billion
for rice imports, he added that if the same amount were
spent on rehabilitating nonfunctional irrigation systems
and acquiring post-harvest facilities, thereby reducing
losses, “we will produce an additional 1.28 million tons
of rice [which will] almost cover our entire rice
shortage, or our yearly imports.” And, if farmers were
encouraged to use certified seeds instead of regular
seeds, he added, “we will be able to produce an extra
583,000 tons of rice [as the] cost of certified seeds
per hectare is only P1,200.”
Angara
also pushed for extending credit at lower interest rates
to rice and corn farmers to boost production, saying
that “Landbank and government financial institutions
must provide credit and, at the same time, we must
harness all rural and development banks of all
rice-growing provinces. The government must support them
by lending directly to rice and corn growers at a lower
interest rate compared with market rates. We must also
encourage local governments to participate in boosting
our agriculture production by providing incentives for
governors and mayors in rice-growing areas who exceed
their target. This will come in the form of
farm-to-market roads and post-harvest facilities
projects,” he added.
He insisted that research and development is the key to
long-term viability and productivity of agriculture,
citing the experience of China in first building its
agricultural base before industrializing.
“While
rice supply in the country is still sufficient, we are
very vulnerable to sudden changes in global prices and
supply. The country is the largest importer of rice,
importing 1.874 million metric tons (MT) of rice, or 10
percent to 15 percent of total consumption, last year,”
the senator said. Philippine fields, he said, have among
the highest productivity potential in Asia—almost double
the current average 3-MT-per-hectare yield of our farms.
“We even have a larger yield per hectare than
Thailand,
the world’s largest rice exporter,” he said.
But Sen.
Mar Roxas II pointed out that more fertilizer for
farmers holds the key to more rice production. He added
that the government most also move quickly to protect
and expand irrigated farmlands.
In a separate statement, Roxas said the over-reliance on
imported rice can be quickly reduced in the short term
by providing fertilizers to Filipino farmers. “We are
importing 2 million metric tons of rice this year. If we
provide our farmers with the right amount of fertilizer
in irrigated lands, we can raise our present production
by about 1.2 million MT a year,” he said.
With rising prices of fertilizer—P1,200 from just P600
last year,—farmers have reduced usage to three bags per
hectare or one-half the ideal amount of six bags. “We
have 1 million hectares of productive irrigated land.
What the government can do is provide additional three
bags of fertilizer per hectare worth around P5,000 to
raise yield by 1.2 MT a hectare,” he explained.
Investing in fertilizers for farmers would yield more
rice for the country and earnings for the farmers, thus
cutting public expenditures on imported rice that
benefit only the farmers of Thailand, Vietnam, and even
the United States. At the same time, Roxas recalled that
during the food summit last March, President Arroyo
committed about P15 billion worth of agricultural credit
to farmers. He estimated that “even just P5 billion of
this will cover the additional fertilizer needed by
farmers to increase their rice yields.”
He, likewise, pressed the need to increase the number of
hectares being irrigated and to protect the existing
irrigated hectarage. “We need to strictly enforce a
nationwide ban on the conversion of irrigated
agricultural lands for commercial or industrial
purposes,” he said, stressing that the average yield of
irrigated land is almost 2 MT per hectare more than the
yield of rain-fed land.
To
increase the irrigated hectarage, Roxas also recommended
the development of small-water impounding systems, which
would cost P30,000 per hectare, saying “this is better
than large-scale irrigation systems, which not only cost
P100,000 per hectare but also tend to be harder to
manage and maintain.” |
