Taipan Lucio Tan has instructed officials of his two banks — Allied Bank and the Philippine National Bank — to study the possibility of opening special lending windows to farmers of hybrid rice.
Tan, whose first doctorate was in applied agriculture, told The STAR that his aim in providing financial assistance to rice farmers is to help increase their income to P50,000 per hectare from their current earning of between P15,000 to P20,000 per hectare.
The PNB and Allied, Tan said, would separately allot up to P2 billion each for the planned special lending window.
Tan recently visited the Philrice Institute in Muñoz, Nueva Ecija to meet with scientist experimenting with the hybrid rice strain from China.
Tan met with Frisco Malabanan, director of the Department of Agriculture’s rice program as well as a Chinese scientist helping in the propagation of the hybrid rice technology.
Apart from funding hybrid rice, Tan said, the special lending window would also provide financial assistance for post-harvest facilities and dryers.
The DA has repeatedly said that the lack of adequate post-harvest facilities contributes up to 25 percent of losses in rice and corn harvest.