Palay harvest up 14%

The country’s unmilled rice harvest in the third quarter is expected to grow by not “less than 20 percent” from the yield in the same period last year, Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala said.

Farmers harvested 7.57 million metric tons (MT) of unmilled rice in the first half of the year, representing a 14.4 percent increase from the 6.62 million MT in the same period last year.

In an interview with reporters, Alcala said good weather and timely government interventions to farmers seemed to be working well.

“The third quarter increase will not be less than 20 percent from last year,” he said.

According to the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics, the country’s palay yield in the third quarter of 2010 was 2.64 million MT.

Corn harvest hit 3.30 million MT, a 37 percent jump from last year’s 2.41 million MT.

The previous highest first semester rice yield was recorded in 2009, at 7.37 million MT. The past highest corn yield was 3.29 million MT, which was harvested in the first semester of 2008.

Alcala noted that reports from the field indicated that rice crops were growing tall due to good weather. This month, two typhoons entered the country’s territory but did not make landfall.

Despite the anticipated robust harvest, Alcala said he was not yet lowering his target for rice importation of 500,000 MT. For 2011, the Philippines imported 860,000 metric tons of rice. In 2010, the country bought 2.4 million tons of rice in the world market.  Kristine L. Alave