Addressing Food Crisis! (First of 3-parts) RELYING ON FOOD IMPORTS WILL WORSEN SUPPLY WOES

The worst reaction to a crisis is to panic and get rattled because that is a recipe for a complete disaster.

The announced plan by the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) to fast-track the importation of food supplies, including the proposal to lower tariff rates to incentivize importation, is a move which in the long term would do more harm than good.

The move reeks of panic and desperation rather than a well-studied measure to address a looming crisis.

Let me just clarify that this post is not intended to show people that I am better than the other officials but I can proudly say that as a local chief executive, I had been through worse crisis in governance and, with God’s grace, survived.

This is my personal view as a farmer and an agriculture stakeholder and most of all, as a personal friend of President Rody Duterte who would like to see him succeed.

I was part of the original group who campaigned hard for President Rody Duterte, even spending my birthday in 2014 on the road in the middle of the night moving around the country to convince him to run.

As a personal friend of the President, I cannot just stay in the sidelines and watch people who did not even campaign for him destroy his legacy.

It is my moral obligation to point out wrong policies which would affect his performance as President.

Importing food supplies to address a looming shortage could be a good strategy when done in moderation because any excessive and unimpeded importation would have an adverse effect on farming intentions, thus stunting productivity.

It’s just like treating a sick chicken by injecting it with 10-ml of antibiotics when all that is needed is only 2-ml. Imbes na gagaling ang manok, patay sa overdose.

What our economic planning agency, with help of Agriculture stakeholders, should do is maintain a level-headed assessment of the problem.

There is no reason to panic or get rattled. There will always be remedies to the current situation we are in right now.

The first thing that should be done is to identify the root cause of the problem and in this case, it is the shortage of protein-rich food which comes in the form of meat and fish.

There is indeed a short supply of pork due to the lockdowns when hog raisers were forced to cull their production for lack of access to market.

The price of pork is high not because farmers are hoarding it but because of the attendant risks in hog raising posed mainly by the unabated spread of the African Swine Fever which lately was reported to have killed 5.5-million hogs all over the country.

The shortage of pork is putting pressure on chicken supply which, if left unmanaged, will be the next commodity whose price will surge.

The price of fish, another protein source for Flipinos, has also gone up as a result of the short supply of pork.

Now, the Department of Agriculture is planning to import fish, a proposal which comes just when Mindanao will end its three-month closed fishing season and fish will be abundant.

Announcing a massive food importation will dampen the enthusiasm of local producers who are now starting to recover from the losses suffered during the COVID lockdown.

Besides, pinning our hopes on imported food supplies may not be the wise move because there is a worldwide shortage of pork. Chicken prices have also increased.

Added to that are logistical issues, including the lack of refrigerated vans needed to ship meat as most of these are held up in the major ports around the world because of strict quarantine protocols.

The problems that we face now could be addressed through proper planning, projection and admission that there is a looming crisis.

On top of the financial assistance given to hog farmers who lost their stocks, there should be viable strategy on where to raise more hogs to compensate for the losses.

The strategy now is akin to chasing a runaway train with the launching of the Bantay ASF program recently in Batangas where farms were devastated by the ASF.

Ano pa ang babantayan dyan, wala na ngang baboy?

The remedies are two steps behind.

But then, that is water under the bridge. We have crossed the Rubicon and the battle is at hand.

United, we will survive. Divided we will fall and the nation rich with agricultural resources will go through an embarrassing episode of a food crisis.

#GovernanceIsCommonSense!

#KungGustoMaramingParaan!