IN his second State of the Nation Address, President Duterte again vowed that there would be no let up in government efforts to fight illegal drugs. What’s heartening is that he has also underscored the need for the state to ensure food security by preparing producers for climate change. While miners were blamed for the destruction of farms and aquatic resources, the President discussed his beef with them in the context of the impact of their operations on food production.
Duterte cited the case of Mindanao, where food production is on the decline in recent years not only because of long dry spells, but also because of strong typhoons that battered the region. The strongest typhoon to hit the island since the 1970s was Typhoon Pablo (international code name Bopha), which made landfall in Mindanao in December 2012. The banana sector was hardest hit by Pablo, and it took farmers two years before they could fully recover from the devastation caused by the typhoon.
Unfortunately, experts have warned that this natural calamity is now the “new normal” and we should expect strong typhoons, like Supertyphoon Yolanda (international code name Haiyan) and Pablo, to visit the Philippines more frequently. Cognizant of this, the President on Monday issued an order to agencies involved in food production to “look into it and act accordingly”. Also, he urged Congress to immediately pass the National Land Use Act, to stop the conversion of farmlands into other uses.
But directing concerned agencies to “climate-proof” food production is not enough; they should be given the funds to do this. Spending for research and development (R&D) in the Philippines remains very low compared to other Southeast Asian countries. According to data from the Department of Science and Technology, the R&D expenditures of both the private and public sectors in the Philippines have not even reached 1 percent of GDP.
Neighboring countries, like Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia usually invest close of 2 percent of GDP for their R&D efforts.
The government should also expand farmers’s access to crop insurance so they could recoup their losses following a strong typhoon or an El Niño episode. According to the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS), the lack of funds is a major factor behind the limited reach and low coverage of the government’s crop insurance scheme. In a report last year, PIDS senior research fellow Celia Reyes said only 27 percent of rice farmers, 12.2 percent of corn farmers and 3 percent of high-value commercial crop farmers are covered by crop insurance.
If it is indeed serious about “climate-proofing” food production, the Duterte administration must put its money where its mouth is; it should seriously consider allocating more funds for initiatives to achieve this. It is easy to give out orders, but how these will be implemented is another matter. The budget proposed by the national government for 2018 does not inspire much hope that the President’s directive will be carried out as the Department of Agriculture—the agency that leads food production—got less than what it proposed. Lawmakers should look into this and see to it that agencies will be able to comply with the President’s marching order to climate-proof food production.