IT program provides info to rice farmers

SCIENCE CITY OF MUÑOZ, Nueva Ecija, Philippines  – In just five minutes, farmers can now access vital information that they need in their rice production activities.

Now providing the quick and efficient service in the Department of Agriculture-Philippine Rice Research Institute (DA-PhilRice) through its Short Messaging Service (SMS).

PhilRice, DA’s rice research arm, was established in 1985 in this science city situated 141 kilometers northeast of Manila.

The SMS program is being implemented by PhilRice’s PinoyRice Farmers’ Text Center (PFTC), which was launched in 2004 initially as the Farmers’ Text Center (FTC) in answer to the rice farming sector’s inadequate access to new rice production technologies.

“The new service allows farmers and extension workers to get the information that they need within five minutes,” PhilRice executive director Eufemio Rasco Jr. said.

All information seekers have to do is call PFTC (0920-911-1398) through a cellular phone and ask their questions.

PhilRice information specialists Olive Rose Matchoc Asis, Stoix Norbin Pascua, Ronan Zagrado, Oliver Domingo, and Jennylene Malolos noted in a joint award-winning report.

“As most farmers and extension workers are scattered across the country, it is difficult to reach them by the traditional interpersonal methods of extension and communication. New strategies, therefore, are required to effectively disseminate relevant information and appropriate agricultural technologies to them.”

They cited the fact that the Philippines is the “text capital of the Asia Pacific with 66 million Filipino mobile subscribers sending 2.37 billion text message in 2008.”

Today, the PFTC receives an average of 100 text messages a day.

Since it was launched, the project has continually been innovating its strategies to be of greater service to the farming sector and help the country achieve self-sufficiency in rice soonest through the initiative of DA Secretary Proceso J. Alcala.

Just recently, the text center began offering a new service that automatically provides the characteristics of rice varieties released by the DA-National Seed Industry Council (NSIC).

The maturity period of rice varieties, yield, and reaction to posts are among the commonly asked questions in the PFTC.

The PhilRice-PFTC also recently developed another SMS-based information service to help farmers manage rice posts. The service mainly includes integrated post management (IPM) strategies.

The PFTC has to date won several awards, among them from the Crop Science Society of the Philippines (CSSP) and the 23rd National Rice Research and Development Conference (2010).

PFTC is a component of the Open Academy for Philippine Agriculture which explores application of text messaging in Philippine agriculture.

OPAPA is a joint venture of PhilRice (lead agency), Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCAARRD), DA-Agricultural Training Institute (ATI), DA-Bureau of Agricultural Research, and some state tertiary institutions, among them the Central Luzon State University.

OPAPA recently won the Saudi-Arabic-based Arab Gulf Program for Development (AGFUND), a regional development funding organization that works internationally in the field of development. To date, AGFUND has supported 1,268 projects in 133 developing countries, including the Philippines.