Agriculture is everybody’s business

Last June 13, I had a disturbing experience that convinced me that agriculture should be everybody’s business.

According to National Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) president William Padolina, more than 300,000 farmers are losing their livelihood due to coconut scale insects (CSI). These insects came from neighboring countries and our quarantine procedures failed to prevent their entry into our shores.

The Customs Declaration Form is one important piece of paper that can be used to prevent harmful insects such as CSI from invading our country. This form was missing at the Naia when I arrived from an Asean conference last week. The airline manager on duty said she had been requesting the Bureau of Customs (BOC) for these forms for the last two months, but received no action.

Maybe the airline management was not insistent enough. Perhaps the BOC did not know its importance. Possibly the Department of Agriculture (DA) did not know about this (though there were 11 DA personnel with me on the same flight). And sadly, the arriving passengers who realized the importance of these missing forms in the light of the devastating CSI infestation did not bother to complain.

It is possible that all these parties do not care enough because they believe agriculture is none of their business.

Coconut industry

More than 3 million coconut farmers today earn an average of just P20,000 a year. They constitute the largest and poorest land-based agriculture sector.

They now face a severe CSI crisis that is spreading fast.

Coconut covers 355 million hectares in 68 out of 81 provinces, and is present in 1,195 out of 1,454 municipalities. Despite the coconut farmers being entitled to at least P70 billion of the coconut levy, not a centavo from this fund has been used to combat the CSI.

CSI originated from a member-nation of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

The entry of deadly pests can happen again unless our quarantine procedures are tightened. But the opposite is happening. For example, the Customs Declaration Form has been absent for the last two months.

This important form asks: “Are you bringing in live animals, plants, fishes, and/or their products and by-products? (If yes, please see a Customs Officer before proceeding to the Quarantine Office).”

The passenger must answer yes or no, under the following condition: “I hereby certify under penalty of law that this declaration is true and correct.”

No big deal

Some say that the absence of these forms for the last two months is “no big deal”. This is because it just affects agriculture. In our published statistics, agriculture constitutes 12 percent of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP). It is approximately only 1/5 of the service sector’s 57 percent share and 1/3 of the industry sector’s 31 percent share.

This is misleading. Dr. Rolando Dy states that while agriculture itself contributes 12 percent to GDP, the manufacturing and trade-service components of agriculture contribute 10 percent and 15 percent, respectively. Take away agriculture, and 37 percent of our GDP is affected.

Unfortunately, agriculture is the sector that has shown the worst growth in the last four years: 2 percent, 2 percent, 3 percent, and 1 percent. This is well below the target of 4.5 percent for these same years.

In the first quarter of this year, the sector grew by less than 1 percent at 0.7 percent. A reason given is that the agricultural subsectors have no roadmaps, while manufacturing with 26 subsector roadmaps posted a 10.3 percent growth last year.

Highest priority

We must give agriculture the highest priority. Our government should launch a concerted information drive to orient both the public and private sectors on agriculture’s crucial role in our nation and our well-being.

In the simple example of the missing declaration form, our citizens should be made aware that its absence may cause future pests and diseases such as the CSI to harm our economic growth and make our poor even poorer. Each party should then take the appropriate action by strongly insisting that these forms be provided immediately—from the airline company to the arriving knowledgeable passengers to the DA to the BOC to the Department of Finance (which supervises the BOC). There are many more examples in agriculture that we should pay attention to and not simply ignore.

Agriculture is the very lifeblood of our nation. It should be everybody’s business.

(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, email [email protected] or telefax (02) 8522112).