Most farmers do not realize how much money they can make from soy. Even less know the joy that can come from soy through family bonding and better health.
Rosemarie Aquino (0915-4622438) is the Technical Working Group (TWG) chair of the Department of Agriculture’s Accelerated Soybean Production and Utilization Program. My interview with her revealed opportunities that she says most of our people do not know about.
Financial picture
Aquino said that 1 kilo of soy sells for P30, while its cost is P18. That should provide the motivation to plant soy. However, as her sad experience in Isabela taught her, the absence of a sure market can mean that this promise of profit can result in substantial losses.
At one time, Isabela had 500 hectares of soy. This was largely because Nestlé had contracts to buy soy from the farmers. However, when the farmers pole-vaulted and sold their soy to opportunistic traders instead of honoring their contracts, Nestlé pulled out. With no sure market after this, farmers started losing money. Thus, in 2011, the 500 hectares had decreased to only 50 hectares.
That year, under Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala’s leadership, a program to revitalize the soy industry was launched. The soy roadmap nurtured by Assistant Secretary Dante de Lima, which I had previously written about in “Roadmaps and Growth,” was developed and implemented.
Today, there are 300 hectares of soy in Isabela. With the information and technology transfer on soy underway, the goal of 1,500 hectares by 2015 will be easily met.
Profitable Soy Uses
The key to soy profit is shifting its use from animal feeds to human consumption. If you bring a P30 kilo of soy to the market and pay P15 for its grinding, you will get 6 to 8 liters of soy milk. Assuming 6 liters at P60 a kilo, you will then multiply your value by 11 times.
Many people, satisfied by the money from milk, then throw away the solid residue (sapal). Some sell this for P20 a kilo, because this can be given as protein input for feeds. This is where technology comes in.
If you take the sapal and process it into food, it will yield you a price of at least five times the value of raw sapal. We called a store in Malabon that sells this ground sapal which is now edible food. The price per kilo is as follows: vegemeat—P140; vege-tapa and vege-tocino—P160.
You can make more money if you get into the small livelihood retail business. Many have made even more money by competing with the P10 fishballs with their equivalent P5 vege-meatballs.
What is our summary revenue gain estimate? If one converted and processed the soy into food rather than animal feeds, the revenue per kilo would be as follows: P360 for milk and a conservative P100 for vegemeat, totaling P460 in revenue. The costs would be P18 for soy production, P15 for grinding at the market, and the minimal amount needed to convert the ground sapal into edible high value food. This minimal amount can include condiments that could even put higher value to the vegemeat by making vegemeat burgers, bola-bola (meatballs), and nutrient-rich sandwiches. The return is more than 12 times the cost.
The journey to adding value to soy can be done through family enterprises that have family members bond together in a joint effort. They can look for the unutilized space between their traditional crops such as corn, and plant the soy there. This would not only add income. It would also add nutrients to the soil to generate the fertility that has been damaged through the over-use of chemicals, thus generating additional savings on fertilizer costs.
Conclusion
The lesson from Isabela should be transmitted to all parts of the country. With information dissemination and technology transfer, we can have better and healthier food, as well as higher incomes. Doing this through the nuclear family in the farms can help strengthen the family bonding in pursuit of these objectives. Money and joy can be achieved not only through soy, but also through the agricultural potential in other crops we are currently not tapping. This is because of inadequate information and technology.
Let the success story of soy in Isabela lead the way. The municipal mayors throughout the country, supported by the Department of Agriculture, should follow suit with a comprehensive and concerted agricultural information and technology transfer program.
(The author is chair of Agriwatch, former Secretary for Presidential Flagship Programs and Projects, and former Undersecretary for Agriculture, Trade and Industry. For inquiries and suggestions, e-mail agriwatch_phil@yahoo.com or telefax 852-2112.)