Who Deceived the President?
By Manny Pinol
Driving along the national highway in Barangay Balindog, Kidapawan City a few days ago, I could not help but be amused by the picture of President Aquino, Agriculture Sec. Proceso Alcala and DA Regional Director Beng Datukan in a huge tarpaulin streamer in front of the BPI Nursery proudly announcing the “export of organic rice” from North Cotabato.
Whoever made the President believe that the export of the organic rice produced in M’lang, North Cotabato was an achievement of the Dept. of Agriculture under this administration was pulling PNoy’s leg.
The organic rice from M’lang which is now being exported is a product of years of sacrifices by a non-government organization, a real one, Don Bosco, which led the advocacy in producing organic farm products.
The Department of Agriculture hardly had anything to do with the accomplishment of Don Bosco and the farmers who believed in producing organic rice.
But top DA officials made the President believe that it was an achievement which could be trumpeted by the administration, even to the point of the supposed rice exportation being included in the last State of the Nation Address of the Chief Executive.
It was a necessary lie to cover up for the miserable failure of the Department of Agriculture to make good its promise at the start of the term of President Aquino to make the Philippines a rice exporter in six years.
Today, four years into the Aquino Presidency, the Philippines is still importing rice in huge volume at reportedly questionable purchase price.
The small volume of organic rice produced by farmers under the supervision of Don Bosco is being exported not because of excess production but because there is a huge demand for organic food elsewhere in the world.
When Sec. Alcala made the pronouncement over three years ago that the Philippines will become a rice exporting country during the Aquino administration, I almost fell off my seat.
There are basically two reasons why I was greatly disappointed by that bold prediction.
First, a Secretary of Agriculture who sees the production of rice as the end-all and be-all of his efforts simply does not have a profound understanding of agriculture.
Sec. Alcala should have been told by his advisers that it is impossible to increase rice production in the Philippines unless there is a massive effort to establish more irrigation systems.
He should have also been told that there is an unstoppable increase in population in contrast to the shrinking rice production areas.
Second, the focus on rice production and the obsession to export rice jeopardizes other equally important agriculture projects like high-value crops.
In three years, for example, the price of rubber plummeted from almost P100 per kilo to only about P38 now in North Cotabato, a problem so serious it resulted in an attack by communist rebels on a rubber processing plant owned by a big rubber trader in North Cotabato Sunday night.
The price opraf co fell from about P55 per kilo a few years ago to only about P20 now.
The banana industry tumbled and suffered following a stand off with China over Spratlys Islands while the price of Oil Palm has gone down to its lowest in years.
In spite of all these developments in the high-value crops industry, there was hardly any effort by the Dept. of Agriculture to address the situation.
Today, as the extent of corruption in government, including the Dept. of Agriculture, is being bared by the daily exposes on the misuse of the pork barrel funds, the last two years of the Aquino administration will hardly see any improvement in the field of agriculture.
The much-ballyhooed rice exportation target for the Philippines in the six years of the Aquino administration will be a perfect example of how the President, who hardly has any background in agriculture, was hoodwinked by his so-called agricultural advisers.
Whoever made the President believe that the country will be a rice exporter should be held accountable.
(Photo credit: Photo downloaded from earthislands.org)
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