New agri chief targets 4% growth

MANILA, Philippines — Acting Agriculture Secretary William Dar wants to grow the sector by as much as four percent in the next three years to achieve greater food security.

During his first Cabinet meeting Monday night, Dar said President Duterte’s marching order was to improve the growth of the industry to be able to significantly contribute to the country’s economy.

“Our population growth rate is 1.8 percent, we have to be higher than that. In the next three years, we should hit three to four percent,” Dar said.

“We can reach this over time with the right framework, right strategies and right programs. We will reinvent and strengthen the programs and match it with our vision with food security still our primary goal,” he said.

Over the last 10 years, the sector only grew by a measly average of 1.1 percent, always short of feeding the country’s growing population.

“The President told me to just do it right and with legal basis. The President’s campaign is no corruption and no criminality,” he said.

 Dar has proposed a strategy built around eight paradigms that also make up the “new thinking” for agriculture to help realize Duterte’s vision for a food-secure Philippines and to double the income of farmers and fisherfolks.

These include modernization of agriculture, industrialization, promotion of exports, farm consolidation, roadmap development, infrastructure development, higher budget and investments for agriculture, and legislative support.

“We’ll have a much broader perspective for agriculture as an industry, from production to high value adding to processing and marketing, both local and global. The value chain approach will help farmers earn more,” Dar said.

“We must find more ways to help smallholder Filipino farmers and fishermen double their income in five years. This is a big challenge, but if we are united, purposeful, and systematic, we can do it,” he said.

In the near-term, however, Dar said DA’s focus in the next 100 days is to accelerate the implementation of the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund.

He said the RCEF would give farmers important interventions that could make them more productive, competitive and profitable.

“In the next 100 days, we should have reached out to three million farmers. We have to give RCEF a chance,” he said.

Dar cited the importance of agripreneurship in modernizing Philippine agriculture, as farming and fisheries should be treated as business undertakings.

He also underscored the need to create the framework for the digitization of farming and agribusiness activities in the country where credit is available, affordable and accessible.

Apart from this, Dar is pushing for a systematic and long-term strategy in developing and promoting exports of raw and processed agricultural products to achieve economies of scale in on-farm production that will generate sustained quantity and quality of export products.

“The government must also promote and support farm consolidation arrangements and should take the lead in generating the big ideas for the roadmaps, and should solicit inputs from the private sector and other stakeholders,” he said.

Dar noted the importance of the Build Build Build program to improve linkages to the urban and domestic and export markets.

“The government and the private sector must provide the necessary budget and investment to grow and develop

Philippine agriculture. The increased budget will help unlock the bigger potential contribution of agriculture and agribusiness to the economy, including more employment opportunities,” he said.

Meanwhile, Dar called out non-performing officials of the agency, saying he would give them time to improve their jobs.

“I don’t want to just remove them. But they should perform otherwise they will be sent out. Everyone should move,” Dar said.

Dar credited former Agriculture secretary Emmanuel Pinol, who is moving to the Mindanao Development Authority, for his good work, saying he will build from there.

“He did what he could. We will make improvements, strengthen what we already have,” Dar said.

In a statement issued yesterday following the appointment of Dar, Pinol said his differences with the economic managers on critical issues, especially the rice liberalization, made his stay at DA untenable.