Tuesday, September 09, 2008 DA pursues plan to address rice problem By Robert Domoguen
ACHIEVING rice sufficiency in the country looks brighter as the government pours in much needed investment to improve production, irrigation, post-harvest, and other rural infrastructure to make the rice farming sector more profitable and a reliable source of table rice for the nation.
However, rice-eating Filipinos will have to wait until 2010 before they can have assurance that this main food staple is sufficiently available. Such a projection is so far the latest, on which government interventions and targets are now being mobilized to work on.
Feeding the country's population, now estimated at 90 million with a growth rate of 2.3 percent has been elusive through the years.
Aside from the high population growth rate, several challenges combine as limiting factors to the attainment of the government's target on increasing rice production. These include the following: rapid conversion of rice lands into non-agricultural uses; declining water availability; increasing cost of labor and inputs; changing climatic conditions; environmental degradation; and, biotic (damages caused by poor quality of seeds, seeds, weeds and pests) and abiotic (soil nutrients and water availability) stresses.
In the face of these challenges, rice production in the country has actually shown significant achievements over the past seven years. Official records show that from 2000 to 2007, annual rice production growth rate was at 3.68 percent. Production had an all- time high performance of 7 percent in 2004. In 2007, performance was recorded at 5.96 percent. Still, such increases can hardly match the rising population's demand for rice, according to experts.
The rising demand for rice is the major reason why the Philippines imported an average of 1 million tons of rice per year for the past 10 years. Abnormal conditions necessitated rice importation in 1998 (2 million tons) and in 2005 (1.8 tons).
With the current rice production growth rate and government investments and intervention, the country can achieve 100 percent rice self-sufficiency in 2016, "negating the effects of environmental factors on rice production," according to the country's top rice experts.
Spearheaded by the Department of Agriculture (DA), these experts coming from the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) and other concerned DA agencies, local government executives, non-government organizations, and the academe drafted the Philippine Rice Self-Sufficiency Plan for 2009-2010.
The completed plan has also drawn inputs from consultants coming from the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), former DA Secretaries to include Carlos Dominguez, Senen Bacani, Salvador Escudero, William Dar, Edgardo Angara, Leonardo Montemayor, and Domingo Panganiban.
Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap has already endorsed the plan as the government's blueprint for the implementation of programs and projects aimed at achieving rice self-sufficiency for the country.
If rice self-sufficiency is to be attained earlier, say 2010, the same experts said it is "realistically achievable" by increasing the government's development intervention budget to P1 billion in 2009 and another P1 billion for 2010.
The proposed amount shall cover expenditures on production support; irrigation support; extension and education services; research and development; marketing support; regulatory services; planning, policy and program coordination; and post-harvest and other infrastructure to be implemented in irrigated farms in 49 key focus provinces and rain-fed areas in 80 provinces and cities. However, the main focus of the program's implementation shall be in the 49 focus-provinces where high production is targeted through increased planting of hybrid and certified rice seeds.
The rice self-sufficiency plan also seeks to enlist greater involvement and commitment of the local government units (LGUs) with the provincial governors as champions in the quest for increased rice production.
In the pursuit of national food security, Yap said the rice self-sufficiency plan is doable as "it puts to work President (Gloria Macapagal-) Arroyo's P43.7 billion Fields (Fertilizers, Irrigation and other rural infrastructure, Education and training of farmers, Loans, Dryers and other post-harvest facilities, and Seeds of high yielding varieties) thrust."
The fund for the implementation of the Fields program has been reportedly approved by Arroyo. Now that, in itself, puts pressure on all involved stakeholders to buckle down and hasten service delivery as the clock ticks on to 2010.
