The Department of Agriculture is crafting a comprehensive blueprint to ensure effective implementation of ?high-impact? projects that would cushion the farm sector from the adverse effects of the global economic crisis, Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap said.

The department has decided to focus on ?hard? projects ? as opposed to ?soft? projects like fertilizer support or subsidies to farmers ? to maximize the use of government funds, Yap said.

He said these projects include irrigation maintenance, post-harvest facilities, farm-to-market roads and rural extension work.

?We should hit the ground running in 2009,? Yap said. ?Our goal is to award and implement 60 percent of our hard infrastructure projects by the first half of 2009 so that we can create more jobs and rev up the economy, especially in the countryside.?

Yap?s directives came as Malacañang moved to improve the ?absorptive capacity? ? ability to use budgetary allocations ? of government agencies in 2009.

He explained that in 2009, the government plans to slash the allocations of offices that are slow in implementing projects and re-channel the funds to other agencies able to deliver on their program commitments for the year.

Yap also pointed out the need for the agriculture department to ?synchronize? its investments with the private sector to optimize public spending.

?The DA family will draw up this master plan in [tandem] with industry leaders, so that [we] can pinpoint where the government will have to invest its resources and where the private sector can provide funding and other forms of assistance,? he said.

At the same time, Yap also stressed that the department would monitor closely the implementation of its high-impact projects to ensure the judicious disbursement of funds particularly to its program partners in the private sector.

This objective dovetails with Yap?s earlier order to create teams to conduct ?periodic field validation and rapid appraisal? of the department?s intervention measure.