‘Farmer security is key to food security’

Special report:

MANILA, Philippines — One of the biggest and most worrisome problems the country is facing today is the lack of food security.

What is food security?

According to the United Nations, food security is a situation that exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.

At the recent Jaime V. Ongpin Memorial Lecture on Public Service in Business and Government, Raul Montemayor, the national manager of the Federation of Free Farmers Cooperatives Inc. (FFFCI) and the private sector adviser to the Department of Agriculture, said there are four key aspects of food security: availability, affordability, quality and safety, and sustainability.

How does the Philippines fare as a country in terms of food security?

“Not very well, sad to say.  According to the London-based Economist group, we ranked 73rd worldwide among 113 countries in 2020. Among ASEAN countries, we were third to the last, lower than Myanmar, and outranking only Cambodia and Laos,” Montemayor said.

What’s the reason for this?

One, Montemayor said, is that the country’s capacity to produce food for its growing population has been deteriorating over the years despite the Philippines’ tropical climate and vast natural endowments.

Second is the war in Ukraine and third is the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Indeed, according to the UN, while progress had been made over the years to improve food security, the pandemic has reversed many of these gains, which were already uneven across countries and regions.

“According to estimates by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, COVID-19 has led to a sharp increase in undernourishment with between 720 million and 811 million people in the world facing hunger in 2020, 118 million more people in 2020 than in 2019,” it said.

The fourth reason is climate change.

Against this backdrop, the country’s agricultural authorities need to find solutions fast to address the crisis.

Farmer security

For Montemayor, one way to achieve food security in the country is to help farmers rather than focusing solely on boosting output.

“Unfortunately, this production-oriented approach does not seem to be working. Why? Because it is directed toward the commodity and not the farmer who produces the commodity,” he said.

In 2021, the country’s palay output reached a historical high of almost 20 million tons. But in the same year, rice farmers’ income declined by an estimated P22 billion, or P4,500 per hectare, compared to 2017. This was due to the drop in farm gate prices mainly brought about by over-importation.

Many farmers probably ended up deeper in debt even as banks lent less than one percent of their total loanable funds to small farmers, opting to pay penalties instead of complying with the 10 percent minimum mandated by the Agri-Agra Law.

“The Philippine Statistics Authority reported that overall poverty, and most likely also rural poverty, increased in 2021 compared to 2018. So, despite the fact that we harvested more palay, our farmers ended up in a worse situation. In other words, maraming ani pero walang kita,” Montemayor said.

Improving post-harvest facilities

Beyond raising production, Montemayor said authorities should also take a close look at the amount of food ost due to the lack of drying, storage and other post-harvest facilities.

It is also important to upgrade distribution and logistics system so that the products from the farm reach consumers at the right place and time where and when they are needed, and are not left to rot in the fields due to the lack of dryers or interim storage facilities.

For food prices, Montemayor said: “The more we allow imports to displace local production, the less incentive for our own farmers to continue producing and becoming more efficient, and the more dependent we become on foreign suppliers for our basic food requirements.”

“This does not mean that we should ban imports and aspire for 100 percent self-sufficiency for all of our food. We should also find ways to lower the cost of production of farmers and improve their productivity so that they can supply food at lower cost.  Having said that, we must be careful not to flood our markets with cheap imports just to keep food prices low. The more we allow imports to displace local production, the less incentive for our own farmers to continue producing and becoming more efficient, and the more dependent we become on foreign suppliers for our basic food requirements,” he said.

Ballooning agricultural trade deficit

Montemayor, in his presentation, also lamented that when the Philippines acceded to the World Trade Organization in 1995, the country’s agricultural imports were basically equal to exports.

“Since then, and after entering many other free trade agreements, our agricultural trade deficit has ballooned to as much as $9 billion a year. We have lost nearly a million jobs in agriculture during the same period. We now import not only rice, corn, fish and meats, but also mongo, peanuts, black pepper, sugar, and even salt,” he said.

Aging farmers

Another problem affecting food security in the country is aging farmers.

“Unfortunately, our farmers are an aging, if not a dying, breed. They do not see much hope in farming. Nor do their children, whose dreams are to land jobs in the cities or work abroad so that they will not have to farm like their parents. If they all leave their farms, where will they go? And where will we get the food we need?” Montemayor said.

Giving importance to farmers is therefore very important, he said, citing India’s example when it renamed its agriculture department to the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmer Welfare.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi was quoted as saying that “rural and agricultural development can only be complete when the welfare of the farmer is also ensured.”

Modi could have added that his country’s social, political, economic, and ultimately national, security and progress could not be achieved for as long as millions of small farmers remained poor and insecure, Montemayor said.

At the same lecture, Rene Cerilla, legal officer and advocacy leader of the Pambansang Kilusan ng mga Samahan ng Magsasaka, said farmers are also finding it difficult to cope with the onslaught of climate change.

“Malaking issue talaga ang climate change. Yung mga bagyo, mas malakas na ang tama. (Climate change is really a big issue for us. Storms and typhoons are more intense now),” he said.

Montemayor said unlike manna from heaven, food security is not for free.

“We need to work for it and be willing and ready to pay the price so that food will always be available, affordable, safe and nutritious for everyone. A big part of that bill is taking care of our farmers so that they can continue feeding us. Farmer security is the key to food security,” he said.