With millions out of jobs post-COVID-19, we’ll need somewhere to put them. I suggest on the land.
The Philippines is a resource-rich country that squanders its riches. It has some of the lowest productivity for almost any crop — bananas, pineapples, coconut, and coffee being the only four that do well. Guess what, they are grown by corporate farmers—companies who have overcome the absurdity of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) to maintain plantation-style production.
Let me quote Calixto Chikiamco on this: “In the Philippines, we have neglected and continue to neglect agriculture. Instead of productivity, the emphasis is on land distribution—of the wrong kind. The Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program has transformed landless peasants into, the words of National Scientist Dr. Raul Fabella, ‘impoverished landowners.’ Equity for farmer-peasants as a matter of social justice is fine, but the state has shackled them with all sorts of restrictions. They can’t borrow or sell their land within 10 years, or until their amortizations are paid. They can’t succeed too much either, because they or anybody else, for that matter, can’t own farmland beyond five hectares. Since farmers die, their heirs divide the land into ever smaller cuts of land. (The average size is now just a hectare). To top it all, the state gave them collective CLOAs, a sort of communistic documentation of their land ownership with many farmer-beneficiaries covered under just one land title. (About 50 percent of all CARP lands are still under a collective title).
What we need to do is to free the rural land market: free from the restrictions imposed by CARP and the overreach by the Department of Agrarian Reform over all types of rural land. The second stage of social justice, after distribution, is to give farmer beneficiaries control over their own land and not shackle them with all sorts of restrictions.”
This is at the heart of agriculture’s failure, an inability to use land in the most efficient manner. I venture to suggest that farmers may want to own land, but, more importantly, they want to feed their children. Land ownership can come later.
Congress might wish to look at this in a more dispassionate light. Examine the facts, not pander to emotions. By all means, encourage personal land ownership, but allow plantations. Cooperatives are not a solution — they’re a make-do, fraught with difficulties and unnecessary costs.
But the problems of agriculture go far beyond who owns the land. It’s how crops are grown and get to the market. That second one has two problems: inadequate ability to move produce (roads, ports, ships) and money-grubbing middlemen. My wife buys vegetables in the local Pagsanjan market at one-fourth the price in a supermarket.
The government has taken one important step in getting crops to the market by building farm-to-market roads. Of the 9,845 km of roads completed, 1,096 km are farm-to-market roads. But an estimated 13,000 km are necessary, so there’s a long way yet to go. Just giving farmers the ability to get their vegetables directly to the market reduces the middlemen.
Then there’s the matter of how crops are grown. The Philippines ranks near or at the bottom on productivity on almost all crops. During low-yield season, Vietnam grows 6.3 tons of rice per hectare, followed by Thailand at 5.3 tons per hectare. The Philippines, where the International Rice Research Institute sits, is at a mere 3.8 tons per hectare.
Other crops are little better. The type of seed or fertilizer, and how to use it, are part of the problem. But mechanization is another.
There just isn’t any. Rice is dried in a dryer, not on the road. Lack of a steady supply of water is another. Adopting modern technologies still another.
But there’s hope. We have a new agriculture secretary, William Dar, who knows what he’s doing. Upon assumption of office in August 2019, Dar instructed all DA offices and agencies to realign their programs under eight paradigms, namely: modernization, industrialization, export promotion, farm consolidation, infrastructure development, higher budget and investments for agriculture, legislative support, and roadmap development. The agency has extended cash assistance and soft loans to farmers.
Some 23 percent of workers are farmers or from the agriculture sector, yet they account for only 9.3 percent of GDP, and 8.8 percent of exports; in terms of personal income, they have one of the lowest in the country. Agricultural produce should be the Philippines’ biggest export and biggest industry.The youth are fleeing the land for the cities, where we don’t need them. Let’s make it profitable for them to stay home and grow the food we, and the world, need.
Email: wallace_likeitis@wbf.ph