DA, NFA WESTERN VISAYAS PREPARE FOR Q1 HARVEST Report from Remelyn Recoter Regional Director, DA VI

The Department of Agriculture and the National Food Authority in Western Visayas held a Coordination Meeting yesterday with the main agenda on the collaboration and interventions of the Department on the local procurement of NFA for rice buffer stocking.

The meeting was attended by the NFA Regional/Provincial officials led by its newly installed Regional Manager John Robert Hermano, DA APCOs, RAED and FOD Rice Program personnel.

There are 24 rice processing centers (RPC) plus one KOICA RPC in the region which will be validated by NFA provincial managers for partnership as buying stations/pick up points and for possible drying/milling and storage services. A meeting with the farmer’s associations managing the RPCs will be conducted once the validation results from the field is consolidated.

Based on NFA Region 6′ 2019 target of 655,000 bags of rice, NFA still needs 15 more mobile drying units. Two mobile dryers were already provided last year to NFA Iloilo, the rest will be provided from the DBM SARO issued last December 2018 which is for public bidding by February 6, 2019. Available DA service trucks will also be provided for NFA’s use during this dry harvest season. Reports from the field showed that the bulk of harvest of about 77% of area planted will be from February to March 2019.

NFA Provincial Managers will be invited as resource persons in the DA radio programs in the provinces for wide dissemination of NFA support price P 3.70 or a total of PhP 20.70/kilo, other incentives such as farm machineries, seeds and production loan to individual farmers/association provided they will deliver their produce to NFA. Series of meetings will still be conducted to finalize the mechanics for each programs.

These interventions to NFA’s Palay procurement are the DA Secretary Emmanuel Piñol’s directives as proactive measures once the Rice Tariffication Act is passed.