Last March 14, members of the budget committee of the public-private sector National Agriculture and Fisheries Council (NAFC) met to discuss the proposed Department of Agriculture (DA) budget for 2015.
Agriculture Undersecretary Segfredo Serrano and Alyansa Agrikultura president Arsenio Tanchuling, who both head budget committee, should be commended for calling this unprecedented meeting to get the private sector’s input before the budget is submitted to the NAFC.
However, a senior official of the Department of Agriculture (DA) said that the proposed budget had little to do with the subsector roadmaps jointly formulated by the government and the private sector. Consequently, the budget committee heads called for emergency meetings of the agriculture subsectors to address this shortcoming.
If the problem were left unattended, inclusive growth would continue to elude us.
Below is a table from our government’s medium-term development plan.
Our past agriculture growth has been disappointing.
Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala should be credited for turning around the previous administration’s zero-percent growth in 2009 and 2010 to more than 2 percent in 2011 and 2012.
Stark contrast
Unfortunately, 2013 showed only a 1.1-percent growth. In the last five years, the growth has been far from the targeted 3.7 percent. No wonder we lack inclusive growth.
Last year, manufacturing grew by 10.5 percent. It was helped along by the Department of Trade and Industry, which earmarked a P4-billion budget for the sector. This was in stark contrast to the 1.1 percent growth of agriculture, which had the budgetary support of the DA amounting to P65 billion.
The reason why manufacturing grew by that much was that the DTI took into account the subsector roadmaps. Each subsector had a team of private sector leaders with the DTI and relevant government agencies providing the appropriate budget support to implement the roadmaps.
The DA did not do this.
The roadmaps for the different agriculture subsectors are not even factored in the proposed DA budget for 2015.
Also, Jose Elias Inciong, United Broiler Raisers Association (UBRA) president and Agriculture Fisheries 2025 (AF2025) livestock and poultry coordinator, identified the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to be a major obstacle.
Disappointment
Perhaps because of the disappointment with the 1.1-percent growth that accompanied the P65-billion DA budget last year, the DBM has given the DA a preliminary 2015 budget ceiling of P50.7 billion.
This is 28 percent less than the P70.2 billion the DA got this year. On the other hand, the initial 2015 DA budget proposal is P117 billion, or 67 percent more.
What will the final submission to Congress be?
If the private sector were to succeed in helping the DA match the budget recommendations with well-formulated roadmaps, the DBM could change its mind and significantly increase the budget ceiling.
This will be a break from the past.
Since 2010, UBRA and the DA have been asking the DBM for at least a P1.5-billion budget for government and livestock laboratories, which are sadly nonexistent today. This is necessary for the welfare of domestic consumers and foreign acceptance of our exports. The obvious need for this was identified in the Food Security Law passed last year.
The budget proposal has consistently been turned down by DBM.
Inciong asks: “Does the DBM know more than the DA and the private sector regarding what agriculture needs?”
Despite a request for a meeting with the DBM to explain the need for the laboratories, UBRA was turned down and instead told to just write a letter.
Inciong believes that a meeting is necessary so that DBM can understand what the real need is. Besides, the poultry and livestock roadmaps have identified these laboratories as a necessary condition for this sector’s meaningful growth.
‘Boss ko’
At the start of his term, President Aquino told the private sector: “Ikaw ang boss ko.”
But it is only recently that the private sector has been consulted on agriculture roadmaps.
As recent as last week, the private sector’s involvement in drawing up the roadmaps has not been taken into account in the initial 2015 DA budget proposal. Thankfully, the current DA leadership is now correcting this.
It is hoped that the DBM follows the DA’s initiative and engages the private sector. This way, we will have a roadmap-guided DA budget that will meaningfully contribute to inclusive growth.
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(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 (02) 8522112.)