OPINION: A BOUNTIFUL HARVEST
MANILA, APRIL 25, 2008 (STAR) SKETCHES By Ana Marie Pamintuan - Farmers in Nueva Ecija took advantage of three days of scorching summer heat last weekend to lay their palay out to dry the way our farmers have done for ages: spread out with rakes along the pavement.
In Central Luzon the rice fields are green, the water level in rivers and creeks is unusually high for summer and the markets are full of commercial rice.
By early afternoon as I was driving back to Manila last Sunday, the palay was dry enough to be collected and packed in sacks that were arranged in rows along the road.
It’s going to be a good year, I was told in Nueva Ecija; the weather has been good and farmers expect two harvests this year.
The harvest is expected to improve further once farmers switch to hybrid rice varieties. A local government official told me that hybrid rice has a yield that is about 50 percent higher than regular varieties.
But planting instructions of the company that provides the rice seedlings must be followed to the letter. Hybrid seeds cannot be strewn haphazardly, and the seedlings must be planted within two inches of each other. It’s even more backbreaking work than the traditional method of planting rice, which is truly not fun, but the hybrid yield is more rewarding.
What’s hybrid rice like? It can compete with the regular commercial varieties in taste, aroma and texture, I was told. Thailand is using hybrids for its exports.
In Nueva Ecija and the rest of the rice-producing provinces of Central Luzon, there is no shortage of commercial varieties of rice. In fact the region is expecting a bountiful harvest this year.
What may be in short supply, as in the rest of the country, is the cheapest variety that is subsidized by the National Food Authority (NFA) and now rationed to the poor.
The government may have a problem encouraging farmers to plant rice for NFA distribution. People naturally want to maximize the use of their lands and earn a bigger profit. If they can switch from cheap rice to higher-grade commercial varieties or other more profitable crops suitable to the land, they will do it.
This is true not only in the Philippines but all over the world. This is one of the factors behind the failure of the international community to eradicate the poppy fields in Afghanistan.
If governments want to boost production of rice varieties that the poorest of the poor can afford, they should find ways of making it more profitable for the farmers.
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The incentives are still missing. Subsidies are not enough; government resources are limited.
In the rice granary of Central Luzon, it’s hard to believe the country may be facing a shortage of rice.
Even without switching to hybrid rice, the potential to increase production is still there. Nueva Ecija residents told me that they still have vast open fields that can be planted to rice.
But those open fields need irrigation, farm-to-market roads – all the basic requirements of rice production that the government cannot adequately provide to make the country self-sufficient in its staple, if not an exporter of rice like its neighbors.
Though rice production can be done manually, farming machinery and palay drying facilities can of course be a boon. Beneficiaries of agrarian reform can be assisted in setting up cooperatives that can rent farm machinery and post-harvest facilities from the government at subsidized rates.
That kind of farm support does not come easy for provinces known to be opposition bailiwicks such as Nueva Ecija. In such areas, local government officials and their supporters have to make do with their own resources for many things including irrigation, roads and electrification. When local resources are stretched thin, developing new rice lands will have to wait.
Nueva Ecija is turning to solar power for its street lighting. The rice land that I visited is fertilized with dried animal dung collected from an adjacent hog farm, where the dung is also converted into methane that fuels all cooking facilities in the farm. The hog farm may soon be completely powered by methane.
The people of Nueva Ecija are still selling their rice and other farm products to the rest of the country. But other provinces are starting to hang on to their products whose prices are on the rise. From rice to pork, communities and countries are starting to keep their food products to themselves amid scary stories of food shortages.
The global food problem has highlighted one aspect, which the unscrupulous are exploiting: hoarding leads to price increases and consequently bigger profits.
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With food riots erupting in some countries, the rice supply has become politicized. Elective officials at both the national and local levels don’t want their constituents to think they are to blame for any food shortage, and are stocking up on imports or holding on to homegrown supplies.
This in turn could be inadvertently creating artificial shortages elsewhere and raising food prices. This is aggravated by the deliberate hoarding of rice by businessmen to push up prices. A number of these traders enjoy the protection of certain influential crooks.
And so despite good weather and the prospect of an abundant rice harvest this year, retail prices of rice have soared in recent weeks.
The government can either flood the market with imports or else go for long-term solutions to boost local rice production.
Importation has become harder with countries suspending their rice exports.
The second option has always been there. Faced with the prospect of mass unrest, the government must now pursue this option with more zeal.
Chief News Editor: Sol Jose Vanzi
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by PHILIPPINE HEADLINE NEWS ONLINE
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