Rice and a party

Today, Tuesday, from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., the Manila Overseas Press Club has Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel as its guest of honor and speaker during the MOPCA Agriculture Forum at the Fairmont Hotel Ballroom in Makati.

The major conglomerates, businessmen and senior newsmen have booked tables for this first ever no-holds barred interaction with Secretary Francis, a high school dropout and a self-made deep-sea fishing billionaire.

Francis is expected to discuss: 1) the food crisis; 2) the Department of Agriculture’s road map to agriculture modernization; 3) the coming boom in Philippine agriculture; 4) why our businessmen and foreign investors must invest in Philippine agriculture and 5) Philippine agriculture’s vast potential.

About 25 percent of food demand cannot be met by local supply. There is supply abroad. You can buy it but at a high cost. And even if you have the money to pay for it, you are not guaranteed the seller wants to sell to you.

Take India, the world’s largest rice exporter. It accounted for 40 percent of the global rice trade in 2022. In July 2023, India began restricting rice exports. It banned exports of white rice. Then it slapped a tax on parboiled rice exports in August 2023. It imposed a minimum export price for its basmati rice of $1,200, later lowered to $950 per ton. The consequence: the highest global rice prices in 15 years, according to the US Agriculture Department. Because India curbed rice exports, PM Narendra Modi became unpopular, having angered his farmers who began earning less. Modi suffered electoral losses in rural constituencies – proof that rice and politics do mix.

This year, India also curbed corn exports to Southeast Asia by 84 percent. Demand for rice and corn is rising globally. Yet, output is decreasing, for a number of reasons, including bad weather.

This year, the Philippines, per USDA forecast, will import more than 4.7 million tons of rice, up from 3.8 million tons in 2023. The Philippines is the world’s biggest rice importer. At $1,000 per ton, 4.7 million tons are worth $4.7 billion. At $500 per ton, 4.7 million tons are worth $2.35 billion, which if multiplied by P57 is P134 billion.

For the same P134 billion you can irrigate 100,000 hectares which will yield one million tons of palay or 650,000 tons of rice. This implies that if we devote the money spent on rice imports to irrigating unirrigated rice fields, we can probably solve our rice shortage in less than seven years. This is on the irrigation side alone of the rice problem.

Add factors like higher yielding rice varieties, better fertilizer input, greater mechanization, more post-harvest facilities like driers and warehouses, more cash ayuda to farmers and yes, curbs on corruption, and you have a better chance of solving the rice crisis during the remaining years of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. A P20 per kilo doesn’t look like a weird promise, after all.

On Sept. 13, 2024, his 67th birthday, President Marcos launched in Central Luzon the Agri-Puhunan at Pantawid (APP) program to increase the rice yield in 1.2 million hectares.

Funded initially with P3 billion, APP targets increasing farmers’ productivity and income by providing them low-cost credit, financial assistance and a ready market for farmers’ harvests, in areas near major irrigation systems like Upper Pampanga, Magat and the Cordillera.

A farmer with one hectare of rice land will receive P58,000, covering production costs – inputs, land preparation, hauling, including a subsistence allowance of P32,000 which will be given P8,000 monthly for four months, with crop insurance cover.

The APP proceeds will complement government subsidies for inputs, services and insurance totaling P14,500 per hectare. Per DA estimates, an APP farmer could net P65,000 per cropping, based on five tons per hectare yield, and after repaying the loan, interest and taxes. The amount includes a P32,000 subsistence allowance.

The National Food Authority (NFA) guarantees to buy the farmer’s harvest. The farmer can sell his surplus harvest to other buyers.

“The APP is contract farming. It guarantees a decent higher income to the farmers while providing the government a stable supply of our staple food. It could reduce rice imports,” Tiu Laurel explains.

“We will provide our farmers money, including credit to farmers for seeds and other inputs, crop insurance, subsistence allowance until harvest and a ready market with the NFA and the Department of Social Welfare and Development for a predetermined volume and income,” says the DA chief.

Secretary Tiu Laurel says APP seeks to make farming more bankable, attract more and bigger investments, nurture a new generation of farmers by uplifting their living conditions and ensure national food security and sustainability in the Philippines.

The initiative, Tiu Laurel hopes, “will finally unlock the potential of agriculture which provides two out of every ten jobs in the Philippines but contributes less than ten percent to the gross domestic product. This will be a game changer.”

President Marcos Jr. spent a tiring day of his birthday interacting with farmers, giving them handouts, farm inputs, tractors and debt condonation papers.

By evening of Sept. 13, he motored to the Marriot Hotel Manila ballroom where First Lady Louise Araneta Marcos gave him a surprise birthday bash, among family, close friends, advisers and half a dozen leading tycoons. Duran, Duran brought the house down. Except for the aging performers, the party was spartan by the standards of a palace party. Food consisted of dumplings, chicken soup, tiny slices of pork and pan fried salmon, nuts and chocolates.

After a long day for the gut, BBM needed to refresh the soul, a little singing, a little dancing. A six-year presidency is a marathon, not a sprint. You need to recharge occasionally to finish the game.

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