Innovation in food production areas key to agricultural development – PBEST

MANILA, Philippines —  Self-contained food production areas and other pockets of innovation and development can further improve the agricultural sector, a study conducted by an environmental group showed.

These food production areas consist of industrial farms and large swathes of land farmed with a lot of mechanization, coupled with small older farms surrounding it – one-to-two-hectare farms that can actually operate together with industrial farms, but not independent of it.

“I actually no longer believe in a countrywide reform and that an overnight change in our economic and political sectors will happen,” said Carlos Primo David, convenor of Philippine Business for Environmental Stewardship (PBEST) and a trustee of think tank Stratbase ADR Institute.

“Within the food production area, there has to be a farm school for training the next generation of farmers and food producers because this is one other issue. I see in the sector wherein obviously, you are not earning a lot from agriculture – then many people shy away from this sector – therefore we have to revive that by establishing farm schools.  The private sector can help establish processing plants within that self-contained area.”

David launched his paper during a recent virtual town hall discussion organized by Stratbase ADR Institute.

He said that beginning the 1950s and 1960s, Philippine leaders have branded agriculture as a third-world endeavor and opted for industrialization at the expense of strengthening the agriculture sector.

This has bred social inequalities like farmers not owning the land they till, as well as inefficiencies in food production.

“In terms of food security and in economic terms, we are at the mercy of the producers, the countries that produce these commodities,” he said.

The idea of food production areas, David said, combines commercial production on the industrial scale with small older farms, training, as well as food processing and storage.

“Industrial-scale farms should be able to co-exist and not compete with smallholder farms if pre-established site-specific agreements are made. In fact, what is envisioned is a symbiotic relationship between corporate and farmer owned farms in a designated food production area,” he said in his paper.

“A climate-resilient agriculture sector should be one of the goalposts of any climate adaptation measure.”

“I believe that through this strategy, we can start realizing, actually, the initial idea of government – the One Town One Product idea – this I think should be the foundation of that,” he said during the launch.