DA scales down palay production target to 17-M tons this year

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Agriculture (DA) has cut its palay production target this year to 17 million metric tons from its original target of 17.4 MMT.

Dr. Frisco Malabanan, director of the Ginintuang Masaganang Ani (GMA) Rice Program of the DA, confirmed to The STAR the new target as he pins his hopes on increased production from hybrid rice.

Hybrid rice yields at least 15 percent more than certified seeds.

“With more hybrid rice areas and greater cooperation from LGUs and the private sector, the rice industry can look forward to achieving the palay production target of 17 million MT or more for cropping year 2010,” Malabanan said.

He said farmers in Isabela and Cagayan were able to double their incomes and increase their yields by an average of 200 percent despite the dry spell by planting hybrid palay seeds.

He said 68 farmer-beneficiaries who took part in the DA’s hybrid rice technology demonstration project harvested an average of 164 cavans of palay per hectare (dry weight), equivalent to 8.86 metric tons per hectare (MT/ha) at 50 to 54 kilograms per cavan.

Several farmers yielded as high as 253 cav/ha or 13.68 MT/ha using various hybrids such as SL-8H, Jolly Rice, Bigante, Mestizo 1, PHB 71 and Rizalina 333, Malabanan said.

The hybrid rice harvests are much higher than the farmers’ usual output of 3-4 MT/ha using inbred rice varieties, Malabanan said.

“This translates into an increase in profit of at least P30,000 per hectare from only P15,000. Hybrid rice achieves greater yields and thus farmers earn more without increasing their cultivation area,” Malabanan said.   

Latest figures submitted to the GMA Rice Program show that 126,645 hectares were planted to hybrid rice during the 2010 dry season.

For the regular 2010 wet cropping season, the program targets 96,888 hectares to be planted to hybrid rice, Malabanan said.

As a recovery plan to offset production losses brought about by El Niño, an additional 64,170 hectares target area will be planted to hybrid rice in Central Luzon, Western Visayas, the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) and the palay-growing provinces of Mindanao.

The DA aims to increase areas planted to hybrid rice to at least 600,000 to 800,000 hectares in 2013.

Malabanan said the DA had encouraged the farmer-beneficiaries from Isabela and Cagayan to use the various hybrid rice seeds available to them so they could see for themselves the benefits of cultivating superior genetic materials.

He noted that the farmers’ dry produce was bought at an average of P14.00/kg, which brought them gross profits ranging from P77,850 to P191,468 even with the drought.