MICHAEL MEDINA
Editor in chief
OZAMIZ CITY--IT is indeed an irony that the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is being situated in the Philippines but the country is just halfway to achieving rice sufficiency as it keeps importing the staple commodity from its neighbors.
IT is indeed an irony that the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is being situated in the Philippines but the country is just halfway to achieving rice sufficiency as it keeps importing the staple commodity from its neighbors.
Truth is, the Philippines, despite being dependent on agriculture, only has 1.3 million hectares of irrigated rice fields in contrast to its never ending population rise.
Compared to Thailand, which has 9.9 million hectares of land devoted to rice planting and Vietnam’s 7.5 million hectares, our country’s area is no match.
Regional Executive Director Oscar Parawan of the agriculture department gave out this revelation to members of the Zamboanga Del Sur-Pagadian City Press Club Inc. (ZPPI) in a press conference, June 23.
Parawan admits: “We lost track in supporting the irrigation project of the country.”
With reagards to population, July 2007 statistics from the National Population Census of the National Statistics Office placed our country’s inhabitants at 88,574,614, a 12.07 million increase since 2000, which was placed at 76,504,077.
Statisticians predict the number of Filipinos will double within 29 years resulting to serious problems in rural and urban areas, especially if their will be not enough jobs and necessary basic needs to keep the same low standard of living.
Unemployment will rise and more probinsiyanos will keep migrating to urban areas owing to the lack of possibilities for subsistence in rural areas.
While in inner cities, problems of housing, unemployment, crime and unhealthy situations will rise, along with the social and economic overpopulation.
Worldwide, five countries control more than two-thirds of world rice exports, with the top ten rice-importing nations account for only a third of overall global rice import statistics.
The Food and Agriculture Association of the United Nations has reported an overall world rice import of 27 million tons in 2004, with Asia on top of the rice importing regions with 11.9 million tons or 41 percent of the global rice imports.
This is followed by Africa, Europe, North, Central America and South America.
Asian farmers cultivate more than 91 percent of the global rice harvest but still, Far Eastern nations import more rice than any other continent.
For the record, the top five importing countries—listed from the top 32 responsible for the 65 percent of world rice imports—are: Nigeria, 1.4 million tons, which accounts 4.8 percent of the global rice imports; followed by Saudi Arabia, 1.2 million tons; Philippines, 1 million tons; Bangladesh, 991,810 tons and Iran, 986,000 tons.
Major exporting countries like Vietnam and India have since promulgated export restrictions to protect their domestic consumers, which in turn contributed to the increase in rice price as the rice supply in the world market slowly dwindled.
While exporters are holding on to their stock of rice, importers began buying more rice to meet their consumption needs and to build their own stock.
This led to hoarding by traders for speculative purposes, which caused market shortages and rise in price have now reached a crisis point, with recent quotes for rice price being as high as $1,000 per ton, added the IRRI.
In the Philippines, what is true is that “we are consuming more than we are producing.” This imbalance, explains the IRRI, “has been partly masked by a reduction in rice stockpiles.”
“In fact, rice stocks are being rapidly depleted, with current stocks at their lowest since 1988. This depletion of stock has moderated the rise in price that would have occurred otherwise. The current low stocks, however, negate the chances of such a moderating influence in the future and increase the risk of a sharp rise in price,” it said.
Another is the slowing annual growth in yield, decreasing substantially over the past 10–15 years in most countries including our country.
The IRRI notes: “In South Asia, average yield growth decreased from 2.14 pecent per year in 1970-90 to 1.40 percent per year in 1990-2005. In some years, this has been below 1 percent.”
“Yield growth in Southeast Asia has decreased similarly. In the major rice-growing countries of Asia, yield growth over the past 5–6 years has been almost nil.”
Then we come to Parawan’s good reason: there is little room for expansion of rice area. With dimunitive zones reserved for rice planting and the slow yield increases, rice production has fallen below growth in demand.
Parawan’s first admission was right. The government was complacent made little effort in looking after agricultural research and development, which could have provided support to increased crop productivity.
The IRRI again explains that in 2000, overall public research intensity, measured by the percentage of agricultural gross domestic product (GDP) invested in public agricultural research, remained low at 0.53 for developing countries.
Going back to the issue of population, the IRRI says Asian region will need to produce 38 million more tons of unmilled rice by 2015 as demand is increasing by around 5 million tons each year.
Then, let us not forget extreme weather and natural disasters occurring every now and then with enormity.
Our country, which is within the storm belt, has always experience major flooding because of typhoons. Human-induced climate, the so-called global warming has steadily risen for the past ten years and this will yet increase in severity and affect the frequency of extreme weather events.
Aiming on the land conversion problem, the government should now be quick in disallowing conversion of farmlands for commercial and industrial uses.
Sometimes, conversion of lands to non-agricultural use is a ploy by landowners to evade the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law or they may sell their lands to rich companies who then turn it into export-crop plantations.
Recently, a two-year moratorium on the sale and conversion of farmlands was declared by President Gloria Arroyo, which covers all irrigated farm lands, alluvial plain land highly suitable for agriculture, agro-industrial crop lands, mangrove areas and fish sanctuaries.
Arroyo said the ban aims “to assure the availability, adequacy, accessibility of food supplies to every Filipino at all times, to meet the needs of the increasing number of Filipinos, there is a need for the production of rice to be optimized to meet our local needs and consumption.”
By 2010, the government expects they will achieve 90 percent rice sufficiency through the implementation of several agricultural support programs.
To meet this goal, the national government is implementing the Fertilizer, Irrigation and Infrastructure, Education & Extension, Loans & Insurance, Dryers and other post-harvest facilities, and Seeds subsidies to farmers (FIELDS).
FIELDS is an intersified food production program aimed at strengthening the country’s ability to provide food for its citizens through a series of efficient and budget-friendly food production modules.
The DA has set aside P500-million from the Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund for fertilizer support and production especially organic fertilizers.
On irrigation and infrastructure, NIA was tasked to finish rehabilitation of irrigation systems by 2010 with a funding of P6-billion a year on irrigation and P6-billion on infrastructure, including farm to market roads, roll-on-roll-off ferry ports, and no-frills airports for agricultural cargo.
On extension and education, the government will give continuous training of farmers and fisherfolk on new technology, with an allocation of P2-billion in research and development, P1-billion each for capability building, trainors and technicians and agricultural and fisheries education system.
On loans, government financial institutions can assure P15- billion availability of agricultural credit.
On dryers and other post-harvest facilities, the DA would establish appropriate integrated processing and trading centers, like the cold chain system and rice and corn processing centers, with a funding of P2-billion.
On seeds, some 600,000 hectares this year will be targeted all over the country for certified seeds, with another 900,000 hectares for hybrid seeds planted by the farmers from 2009-2010. WITH REMAI ALEJADO, PPB