SAN FERNANDO CITY, La Union, Jan. 25 (PIA) – Some 329,462 rice farmers in the Ilocos Region will receive financial assistance amounting to P5,000 each from the Department of Agriculture Regional Field Office 1 (DA-RFO 1).
Through the Rice Farmers Financial Assistance (RFFA) Program, DA RFO-1 targets to disburse over P1.6 billion in the region to cover 138,305 farmers from Pangasinan; 75,963 from Ilocos Sur; 61,691 from Ilocos Norte; and 53,503 from La Union.
Eligible beneficiaries are rice farmers enrolled in the Registry System for Basic Sectors in Agriculture (RSBSA) as of June 30, 2023, tilling two hectares and below of land.
Leah Coloma, DA RFO-1’s focal person on the Rice Banner Program, said the program aims to help assist farmers cope with the cost of production and boost their productivity.
Coloma noted that they started the distribution of financial assistance with their top-up target or among those rice farmers who already have available e-wallet accounts.
“These are the beneficiaries in 2021 and 2022 who have e-wallet accounts or the Interventions Monitoring Card (IMC),” Coloma said.
She said, “In 2021, IMC was issued as merely identification cards of our rice farmers but it was in 2022 when it started to serve as cash cards for recipients to withdraw financial assistance from the DA.”
The distribution, which started on December 28, 2023, is still on going as of this writing.
As of January 24, some 82 percent or 234,865 of the top-up target had already received the financial aid.
Of these, 98,812 are from Pangasinan; 49,863 from Ilocos Norte; 46,705 from Ilocos Sur; and 39,485 from La Union.
Recipients may withdraw via any Banc Net automated teller machines (ATMs) or through Western Union branches.
“Be informed that when you withdraw from any BancNet ATM, it will deduct some transaction charges while for Western Union, you may withdraw the money in full amount,” Coloma said.
The RFFA is an unconditional financial assistance to farmers pledged by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. that was funded by excess tariff collection from rice imports worth P12 billion. (JCR/AMB/CGCC/PIA Region 1)
