Real estate sector bucks repeal of agriculture-agrarian credit

MANILA, Philippines - Real estate industry leaders rallied yesterday behind the agriculture sector for the retention of the mandatory 25 percent credit allocation for agriculture and agrarian reform, in the face of the banking sector’s reported campaign for its repeal.

In a letter to the Senate agriculture committee, Manuel M. Serrano, founder and chairman of the Chamber of Real Estate and Builders Associations (CREBA), said: “We are urging Congress to maintain the 25 percent credit allocation for agriculture and agrarian reform under Presidential Decree 717.

“Revoking this would run counter to the noble aims of the agrarian reform law (CARL) and the agriculture and fisheries modernization law (AFMA), even as it would negate the social justice and economic principles enshrined in our Constitution.

“Such a move would be especially callous at this time when the agriculture sector badly needs credit, in the wake of the devastation wrought by the successive typhoons that recently hit our country.

“Sentiment aside, such a move would amount to economic suicide; for, while we are sacrificing the interests of all other sectors by subjecting the country’s lands to agrarian reform, yet we are not properly arming the peasantry with the means to optimally use such lands towards socio-economic progress for the entire nation.

“Credit support is one of the most fundamental needs of the agriculture sector. Simply put, without sufficient credit, farmers would have no means by which to buy seeds, fertilizers, animal feeds, tools, machinery and many other input.

“For Congress to ignore that need would mean that the terms “food security,” “sustainable development,” “agro-industrialization” and “global competitiveness” mentioned in our laws are nothing more than bare motherhood statements devoid of substance.

“Bangko Sentral statistics show that even with the 25 percent mandatory allocations, loans to the agriculture sector continue to be among the lowest priorities of the banking sector.

“For instance, for the first half of this year, agricultural loans granted by thrift banks averaged only 6.7 percent of total outstanding loans, for rural banks it is 32.9 percent, while for commercial banks it is only 10.7 percent.