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Thursday, August 28, 2003
Region can only produce 64% of its rice needs
By Christie Enriquez-Uayan
DEPARTMENT of Agriculture (DA) 11 Regional Technical Director Romeo dela Cerna Wednesday said the region's rice sufficiency rate is only 64 percent. But, this is no cause for alarm because "our neighbors have the capacity to produce rice enough for consumption".
"Davao City is a trading area, so lahat ng production from Mindanao are sent here. That is why wala tayong problema sa supply ng rice kahit 64 percent lang ma-attain natin," he said.
Dela Cerna said that within the Davao Region, Davao del Norte has surplus production at 123 percent. However, paired with Davao City's 10 percent rice sufficiency rate, then the figure for the whole region is not enough for its population.
With a population of about 1.3 million people and a lesser area devoted for rice farming, dela Cerna said Davao City has become too dependent on its neighboring provinces to augment its supply.
The city, he said, only has about 1,000 hectares of rice land, with an average yield of 5 tons per hectare yield, not enough to provide for Davao's dense population.
Davao Oriental and Compostela Valley provinces have 88 to 89 percent rice sufficiency rate, the DA 11 official added.
He said that to increase the farmers' yield, the DA has been encouraging planters to cultivate hybrid rice, which allows up to 10 tons per hectare yield.
To date, a total of 6,913 hectares of ricefields are planted with the higher yielding hybrid rice variety, dela Cerna said.
Thus, with the massive implementation of hybridization, the region, if not the country could attain a 100 percent rice sufficiency rate within the next two years, even with lesser farmland areas, he said.
Dela Cerna said Philippines has attained a 94 percent rice sufficiency level last year and hopes to attain its full sufficiency by 2004.
By then, the country will no longer become dependent to rice importation, according to dela Cerna. CEU
(August 28, 2003 issue)
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