Phl to be veggie self-sufficient

By Jerome Carlo R. Paunan

Friday 27th of July 2012

QUEZON CITY, July 27 (PIA) -- The Department of Agriculture envisions the country to be vegetable self-sufficient, a statement posted on the agency website (da.gov.ph) said.

“After rice, our next focus is to achieve self-sufficiency in vegetables,” Agriculture Secretary Proceso J. Alcala said.

Alcala said the DA, through its High Value Crops Development Program (HVCDP), aims to increase the country’s current sufficiency level in vegetables, from 65 to 100 percent and beyond, within the medium-term or 2016.

He said the country’s vegetable per capita consumption is estimated at 40 kilograms (kg), which is equivalent to an annual requirement of 3.8 million metric tons (MT) of vegetables for roughly 95 million Filipinos. Such consumption level is just one-fourth of the recommended dietary requirement of 146 kg per year, according to the World Health Organization.

Further, the DA chief urged stakeholders to forge marketing agreements with institutional buyers and consumers, and thereafter plan their respective production and harvest schedules for each commodity. This should be done to obtain reasonable profit, and more importantly, avoid oversupply and sudden drop in prices.

He cited initial efforts of the DA to meet with major vegetable traders from Divisoria wholesale market in Metro Manila to determine their vegetable supply and demand requirements, which will be relayed to farmers’ cooperatives and groups for them to schedule their production, harvest, and delivery operations.

The consultation will be conducted regularly and will form part of the intensified program of the DA through its Agribusiness and Marketing Assistance Service (AMAS) and HVCDP to match and directly link farmers’ groups with wholesale market traders and institutional buyers, with the aim of providing producers and sellers comfortable profit, as well as consumers with regular supply of reasonably-priced, safe and quality vegetables.

Further, he said the DA is identifying other alternative or expansion areas that are less vulnerable to flooding and drought that could produce vegetables year-round or during off-season in traditional farming areas like Benguet, Nueva Ecija, and Bulacan.

This year, the DA, through the HVCDP, has allotted P643 million, or about one-half of the program’s total P1.3-billion budget, to undertake several initiatives to sustain and prop up the country’s vegetable industry. A similar budget is proposed next year. (DA/RJB/JCP-PIA NCR)