Rice and our future

Rice significantly impacts our well-being. Our future will be greatly affected if we do not act decisively on our rice situation before the WTO elimination of rice quantitative restrictions in January 2017.

From a Philrice-sponsored forum last Dec. 4, we gathered information that compared the Philippines with Vietnam and Thailand.

“For yield in terms of annual metric tons per hectare per year, we are producing 46 percent of Vietnam and 87 percent of Thailand. A major reason for Vietnamese’s high yield is its extensive irrigation system which allows three crops a year. By contrast, three-fourth of our rice lands have no irrigation and, therefore, produce only one crop a year.

“For cost in terms of peso per kilogram, we are 89 percent more expensive than Vietnam and 32 percent more expensive than Thailand. A major reason is that we get very little government rice subsidy compared to Vietnam and Thailand.

“For farmer income in terms of peso per hectare, we get 61 percent of Vietnam and 51 percent of Thailand. This is not surprising because we have lower yield and higher cost. What is surprising is that the Thai farmer makes more money than the Vietnamese because he makes more money from his farm.

“For labor productivity in terms of peso per person-day, we are 21 percent as productive as Vietnam and 13 percent as productive as Thailand. Again, Thailand beats Vietnam in this category, largely because it has more mechanization.

Rice summits

The Mindanao and Luzon Rice Summits held in the next seven days must study carefully the action implications from the comparative findings above.

Vietnam’s yield advantage is its extensive irrigation that produces three crops per hectare per year. Our large irrigation budget for 2015 should therefore be managed carefully so we get the best outcome for each single peso spent. To achieve this, monitoring and on-going improvements should be done systematically by the affected farmer beneficiaries to prevent corruption, wastage and fund misuse.

A second area that affects farmer productivity is the mechanization which Thailand effectively uses. Optimum mechanization must be encouraged with financial packages and common service facilities. This means government support for organizing farmers to take advantage of economies of scale.

The third area is to implement an effective farmer extension service system that is sorely lacking today. Our 17,000 agriculture extension workers now report to the LGUs, instead of to the Department of Agriculture (DA). It is now imperative that the LGUs harness these extension workers to provide the farmers with the appropriate support services in production technology, credit availability, and market access. This will partly compensate for the very inadequate subsidy that government currently provides the rice sector.

Palayamanan Plus

It is important that the Rice Summits not focus only on rice, but also on the rice farmer.

The income of the Filipino rice farmer is much less than his counterparts in Vietnam and Thailand. This is because he relies almost solely on his rice income. The Rice Summits must therefore give special attention to the excellent but very much neglected Palayamanan Plus of the DA. In a publication “Agricultural Extension-Worldwide Innovations” by R. Zarabanan, Palayamanan is cited as an outstanding program for “showcasing technologies, techno-demos, and farmer participation in farmer-participated research activities.”

In 2003, R.J. Corrales stated that “the income obtained from small-scale farmers can hardly sustain daily needs of their family because of seasonal harvest and declining profits.” He advocated supplementing rice farming with other income-producing activities.

Ten years later, Palayamanan Plus evolved to identify some of these specific opportunities. One such activity was launched in 2013 in Ligao, Albay, by Mayor Patrica Gonzales-Alsua and Congressman Fernando Gonzales. It identified mushroom production as one of the additional business ventures that would enable the rice farmer to achieve the Palayamanan target of P1 million profit per hectare per year. Instead of the rice straws being burned or dumped as farm waste, they would be the critical element for profitable mushroom production.

Action needed

We do not have much time. The elimination of rice quantitative restrictions is only two years and one month away. If we do not act immediately on actions that appear obvious from the findings identify above, we will end up being overly dependent on imported rice. Given climate change, we cannot be sure if this will be either available or affordable.

Furthermore, our rice farmers will be further impoverished from the loss of their livelihoods. Food security will decrease and poverty increase. We must address our critical rice situation now because it also means our future.

(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).