"Excuses galore."
The recently-released PSA (Philippine Statistics Authority) report on the performance of the agricultural sector last year has confirmed a view that I have held for many years: The development of Philippine agriculture is too important an undertaking to be entrusted solely to the DA (Department of Agriculture). PSA reported last week that the agricultural sector grew by a miniscule 0.56 percent in the year just past, a sharp decline from 2017’s measly 4-percent growth.
Clearly DA—and this includes DAs prior to the Duterte administration—has been falling down on the job. Given an annual population growth rate of around 1.9 percent, an agricultural sector growth rate of 0.56 percent per annum is scandalously low. Even 4-percent annual growth is inadequate; Philippine agriculture should be growing at double-digit rates.
When criticized for DA’s repeatedly below-par performance, the Department’s leadership is even quick to offer excuses—climate change, inadequate funding, political interference, shortage of farm-to-market roads, civil disorder, etc. It is excuses galore. There is hardly ever any mention of inadequate effort, lack of resourcefulness, poor supervision (read: Corruption) and outright incompetence. For the DA folk, something else or someone else is always at fault.
This state of affairs cannot be allowed to continue. The growth of this country’s economy, the welfare of the rural communities and the nation’s food and fiber cannot continue being held to ransom by an entity called the Department of Agriculture.
The time has come for the private sector to give serious consideration to increasing the extent of its involvement in Philippine agriculture. More specifically, the time has come for the zaibatsus of the Philippine economy to make greater investments in this country’s agricultural industries. With the infusion of financial resources will come greater efficiency, better management and, most important, a superior operational mindset.
Among this country’s corporate giants, the ones that have cast their investment net more widely in recent times have been Ayala Corp., San Miguel Corp., Metro Pacific Investment Corp., and SM Foundation. Beyond real estate development and banking—its original core businesses—Ayala’s investment portfolio now includes holdings in health and education facilities. SMC is no newcomer to food production; it is heavily invested in meat production. Like Ayala, MPIC has moved determinedly in the direction of health facilities, and SM Foundation has been investing in educational facilities. All these new interests are, of course, in addition to their heavy investments in energy facilities and tollways and other infrastructure.
The major Philippine agricultural industries—rice, corn, sugarcane and coconuts—have been uncompetitive vis-à-vis the other East Asia countries because of low yields. The per-hectare yields of Philippine rice farms, for instance, are between one-third and one-half of those of Thai and Vietnamese rice farms. Those yields can be raised sharply with the introduction of mechanization, greater irrigation availability, better management and, last but by no means least, a more professional attitude. With the regroupment of the tens of thousands of small, land-reform-created farms, mechanization will become possible. These additional production facilities will become available with the entry into the agricultural sector of this country’s successful, resource-rich corporate giants.
A historical footnote. During the martial law period, President Ferdinand Marcos, upon the advice of his economic managers, issued an Executive Order mandating the large corporate establishments—those with at least a certain number of employees—to make arrangements for supplying their employees with rice. Many companies opted to produce their own rice.
I am making this proposal for the entry of this country’s corporate giants into agriculture in the belief that the DA cannot, now, and in the foreseeable future, be expected to, do a satisfactory job of providing the Philippine people with adequate food, fiber and exports.
Private sector to the rescue, please.