Legislative Agenda #8! Set Up Agro-Industrial Parks, Common Production Facilities

The lack of bio-security measures to prevent the entry and spread of diseases in poultry and hog farms resulted in such catastrophic outbreaks like the Bird Flu in Pampanga in 2017 and the African Swine Fever in 2019.

Karamihan kasi ng ating mga piggeries ay nasa backyard, pati na ang mga egg-layer at broiler farms at isa din ito sa madalas pag-awayan ng mga magkakapitbahay dahil sa amoy at langaw na dala nito.

Hndi natin nai-angat sa industry-level ang ating pag-aalaga ng baboy at manok at ang ating mindset ay palaging backyard lang kaya hindi makakaparami.

Nagiging mataas din ang cost of production sapagkat karamihan nito ay nasa mga lugar na malalayo sa mga feed mills at umaasa lamang sa mga commercial feeds sa palengke.

I visited many agricultural farms in the US, especially cattle fattening farms in Texas, and what was spectacular with the set-up was that these are located in the middle of vast production areas of feed grains.

Right after harvest, the grains are brought to the feed processing facilities and later fed to the cattle, a system which lessens movement of feed materials and reduces the cost of production.

This was one of the advocacies I introduced when I was Chairman of the Mindanao Development Authority – establishing hog and poultry farms in areas where there are corn silos and other feed materials are grown.

MinDA has included this in the list of projects to be included in the MINPAD RISE program.

The proposed Agro-Industrial Parks in each key production area in the country should have the complete facilities, from feed mills to growing, to butchering, to processing and packaging.

Halimbawa, sa Cagayan Valley Region where corn is one of the major products or in Bukidnon which is another major corn production area, there should be an Agro-Industrial Park for the processing of raw materials into feeds which would be used for hog, poultry and egg production inside the park.

The advantage of this is that there would be tighter bio-security control and waste disposal. It could even open up a facility which would use the wastes as soil enricher to be used by farmers in the nearby fields.

Lahat ng farms na mag-relocate sa Agro-Industrial Parks would be provided with incentives by government which would be spelled out in the proposed legislation which I would introduce once in the Senate.

#KungGustoMaramingParaan!

#GovernanceIsCommonSense!