Saturday, April 12, 2008 Arroyo lauded for preventing food riots in RP
PRESIDENT Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is "appropriately concerned" and "very concerned" over the continued rising prices and low supply of food including rice in the world market, which has already sparked civil disturbance and food riots in 33 countries, an official of the United Nation's International Fund for Agriculture Development (Ifad) said.
Kevin Cleaver, Ifad assistant president for programme management department, said while the Philippines is in a short-term but "difficult" situation due to the rice situation, the Arroyo government is properly addressing the situation preventing or limiting chances of possible food riots in the future.
Cleaver added that the Philippines is "not the worst off by any stretch of the imagination. Some are in really desperate conditions. You have a government that's concerned."
"You produce (rice) everyday, the government is talking about it. Imagine a government that's not concerned at all. You'd be in real trouble. She (Arroyo) is appropriately concerned, very concerned on a daily basis. I can tell you, my conversation suggested somebody who's concerned, knows what they're doing and is doing all the measures that she can," he said after his courtesy call to Arroyo in Malacañang.
He added that riots erupted in some countries like Egypt following shortage in food and problems of hunger, which is still far from happening in the Philippines. Aside from Egypt, food riots had also been reported in Uzbekistan and Haiti.
He said the Philippine government, while it would be unable to prevent the rising prices, is doing all it can to ensure the food supply and avoid starvation.
"I'm very confident in the medium and long-term, this problem can be handled pretty easily by the Philippines. In the short term, every country in the world is struggling with this. (But) I understand the Philippines has created a commission to look at the issue of rice pricing, rice policy. And that commission will study the issue. In the long-term the solution is production, invest in agriculture and produce more," he said.
Cleaver added that this "difficult" problem is just short term and not even limited to the Philippines.
He said this stemmed from the failure of some governments to prepare for a rice shortage despite ample warnings from agencies like Ifad, which had been issued as early as two years ago. He said the food shortage problem stemmed from increasing population and increasing income particularly in countries like China and India.
"What happened is the world has been taken by surprise. It's not just the Philippines. Most of the world has been complacent. The food appears in the supermarkets, people were eating it. So nobody really paid much attention to agriculture and all over the world you see degraded infrastructure, farmers who have been neglected, the poorest people in most countries are farmers," he said.
He added that best solution at present is to just "produce more as quickly as possible."
"In the mean time you have a short-term problem, and it's difficult to cure a short-term problem with production that comes a year from now. The Philippines, like every country in the world, has a short-term problem and governments are not magic fairies (that) they can't just swing a wand and make the rice appear. That takes investment, effort and production," he said.
Cleaver said for Ifad's part, it is financing a US$66 million agriculture and rural development program covering the entire Cordillera Administrative Region, which would include microfinance and rehabilitating agricultural infrastructures like irrigation systems, farm-to-market roads and market facilities.
He said aside from the US$66 million, Ifad is likely to put in another US$60 million to cover similar projects and programs in the next two years.
Agriculture Regional Director for Cordillera Berna Romulo-Puyat said the US$66 million would cover the Cordillera Highland Agricultural Resource Management (Charm) project 2 which would cover all provinces in the region that include Abra, Mountain Province, Benguet, Ifugao, Apayao, and Kalinga.
Puyat said Ifad had initially provided a US$9.2 million loan to the Philippines under Charm-1, which initially covered the agriculture and rural development in Abra, Mountain Province and Benguet and benefited about 50,000 people.
The Ifad website said the Charm project costs a total of US$41.5 million, but Cleaver had explained that Ifad is not the sole source of funds in the ongoing projects in the Philippines.
Puyat and Cleaver said Ifad is now looking into possible expansion of program to cover fisheries and coastal resources management industries.
"They (Ifad) visit a region every four years and they chose the Philippines because they saw that the program was very successful. They also have projects in Mindanao. (And) President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo wants them to concentrate in the Muslim areas for their next project," said the agriculture official. (JMR/Sunnex)
