Domoguen: Grassroots agricultural extension system in the region “dis-eased”

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

IF YOU will, please excuse the language and expression employed in the writing of this article that seeks out attention and appeals for better cooperation in the way we feed each other with good food and in making sure the next generation will continue doing the same. Meanwhile our “dis-eased” agricultural extension system needs healing.

The Department of Agriculture ((DA) is responsible in ensuring that food is available and affordable for all. That is correct in its entirety before the devolution of its manpower and budget for extension functions to the local government units (LGUs).

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The Devolution Law practically mandates the LGUs as “Food Czars” in their own domains with the DA as major ally and partner in agricultural development.

In the Cordillera, the extension offices of the DA before the devolution were completely manned with adequate personnel from the provinces, city and the municipalities. After the devolution, some agricultural technicians were given assignments that are not related to their work or transferred to other offices. Vacancies in the offices of the municipal agriculturist were not also filled-up. Some municipalities in the region have no municipal agriculturist or have no agricultural technicians. Agricultural extension work is being sacrificed for something else not related to the advancement of agricultural development in that place.

Several decades since the Devolution Law, this problem of non-filling up of positions and abuse seems to be spreading throughout the region with Benguet Province as the exception.

I really don’t understand why the City of Baguio abolished the City Agriculturist Office, for instance, and still submits project proposals to the DA. In the other provinces, some municipalities retained the municipal agriculture office with no warm bodies manning it, while some have OIC-Municipal Agriculturist, the item position never filled-up after the occupant retired. Some municipalities have never filled-up vacant agricultural extension positions. If you come to it, these municipalities today are the most problematic when in it comes to the implementation of agricultural development programs and projects. Meanwhile an almost similar theme endlessly uttered keeps our grasp on our positions on tenuous strands: “What is the DA doing to solve problems or promote agricultural development in our place.” Given our limited number, we cannot always be present in all municipalities of the region on extended time without sacrificing one or the other.

This is the --nth time I write about the subject. I persist appealing for a conscious attention and conscientious resolution of the problem for agricultural development in the region and other reasons related to rural development. The LGUs concerned cannot go on simply negating the importance of this concern while the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) tolerates the practice ad infinitum. This does not enhance partnerships and the development of capacities to address a very important need nowadays.

For the past years, experts have been warning us of the need to develop local capacities to produce food, and develop and sustain the natural resource base that makes agriculture viable and do its role of feeding a growing population.

“Today, our planet is feeding about 7 billion people. According to the latest estimates, by 2050 it will need to feed another 2 billion. But how? The Food and Agriculture Organization states that it will require a 70 per cent increase in global food production. In this context, agriculture has now become more important than ever. In particular, smallholder agriculture plays a crucial role in addressing the concerns of poor rural people who are both producers and buyers of food.” –IFAD Making a Difference in Asia and the Pacific, February 2012.

Food production in the Cordillera is basically smallholder throughout. And food production is done under a fragile-challenged topography. Today, the resource base is stressed beyond capacity. Stewardship concerns sharply focuses such questions on our readiness to provide food on the table for our people with enough and adequately trained manpower to do the job.

The regime today has seen it fit to increase the budget for agriculture. This necessarily needs people qualified to prepare site-specific project designs suited to the needs and requirements of the local population. After project proposal and feasibility preparation, who will implement these projects?

The lack of manpower bugs the implementation of regular agricultural programs and special projects in the region. With incapacitated local agricultural offices, some political leaders propose that the DA will hire contracted personnel to do the work or download funds to the LGUs for this purpose. Here, the vision of the Devolution Law has not made any impact on the responsible conscience of governance. The request for assistance continues with the DA responding in the best way it can. But unless the LGUs consciously attend to the fixing and stewardship of the “diseased” grassroots agricultural extension system, investments for agricultural development in the region will come to naught. And to think that health and all other human quest for well-being begins with the availability of food.