Agriculture Secretary Luis Lorenzo Jr. said the farm-to-table project’s focus will be to initially install irrigation systems to cover 24,000 hectares devoted to planting high-yielding hybrid rice.
Lorenzo said the project will provide 8,000 units of shallow tube wells and 1,000 units of highly-efficient rice milling facilities.
The project crafted by the Bureau of Soil and Management will be implemented over a two-year period and is expected to boost hybrid rice output by at least 384,000 metric tons.
"This project will generate employment and income at the village level and in the long term, it shall create sustainable policy environment for private sector participation in our national food security program," Lorenzo said.
Lorenzo said participating farmers will be organized into production clusters, each composed of eight members. Each group will be provided a loan to cover pump and engine set per farmer recipient and one village-type rice mill per cluster. The farmers will shoulder pipes and tube well accessories, including shallow tube drilling and installation, and shelter for the rice mill.
This project will complement the P1.2 billion fund the National Food Authority (NFA) and the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) is allocating this year to fund the modernization of the country’s rice mills in line with its goal to reduce post-harvest losses.
The NFA program has been packaged under DBP’s Sustainable Logistics Development Program, a P60-billion undertaking designed to build or improve grains facilities, acquire farm machineries and ocean vessels and uprade ports.
Modernized rice mills should help the country save as much as 272,000 metric tons (MT) of milled rice a year, citing Bureau of Post Harvest Research and Extension (BPHRE) figures which show that about 3.1 percent of the nation’s palay output are lost or being wasted yearly due to poor milling operation.
The country produced 13.5 million mt of palay last year, or equivalent to 8.77 million MT of rice, based on a 65-percent milling recovery. A 3.1-percent loss translates to about 272,000 MT, a volume representing roughly a third of the 800,000 or so tons of rice which the Philippines imports yearly.
NFA officials said the country has some 12,000 rice mills working, but only about 100 of them are capable of producing premium grade rice, or those with 95 percent head rice that meet international standards.
On the other hand, only about 50 percent of the country’s agricultural areas devoted to rice planting have reliable irrigation systems.
Government however, is stepping up irrigation projects to support its target to achieve a 97-percent self-sufficiency in rice this year with projected palay production of 15-million metric tons (MT).
Lorenzo said that barring natural calamities, palay production this year will exceed last year’s yield of 13.5 million MT by intensifying the GMA Rice Program.
If this year’s full-year target is met, the production shortfall is only about 480,000 MT based on the country’s requirement of 15.48 million MT.
For the first semester, the DA is projecting palay production to reach 5.91 million MT, up by 10 percent during the same period last year.
Lorenzo said this year’s target can be achieved by using better and higher-yielding hybrid and certified seeds.
Under GMA’s rice program, about 400,000 hectares will be planted to hybrid and certified rice seeds with 100,000 and 300,000 hectares targeted for planting in the dry season or from November 2003 to April 2004.
For the wet season or from May-October 2004, the program coverage will be expanded to 550,00 hectares, of which 200,000 hectares will be planted to hybrid and 350,000 hectares to certified seeds.
By 2005, the program’s coverage will further increase to 650,000 hectares wherein 400,000 hectares will be planted to hybrid and 250,000 hectares to certified seeds.
The DA is encouraging farmers to switch to hybrid and certified seeds to increase their farm yields and productivity.
Francisco Malabanan, director of GMA rice program, said that for this year, the program will require a budget of P1.49 billion.