Go Negosyo
founder and Private
Sector Advisory Council (PSAC) Lead for Jobs
Joey Concepcion strongly
supports President Ferdinand “Bongbong”Marcos
Jr.’s decision to remain as
Agricultural Secretary until the required structural
reforms are instituted to
make the country’s agriculture sector more efficient and competitive.
President Marcos made the remark in
a recent event with the
Department of Agriculture
(DA).
“Staying as the
lead for agriculture is a
smart decision from the
President. He can quickly
make reforms and ensure
that all systems are in
place to help the country’s
farmers just like what his
father did during his term,”
Concepcion said.
“Having met the mended by Go Negosyo’s
Kapatid Angat Lahat Program (KALAP) Agri Program and think tank group
Foundation for Economic
Freedom (FEF) during
their meeting with Department of Agrarian Reform
(DAR) officials, led by
Secretary Conrado Estrella III.
“For the period
2001-2021, the annual
average contribution of
agriculture to the Gross
Domestic Product (GDP)
is just 0.3 % while industry and the service sectors
contributed 1.4 percent 3.1
percent, respectively. This
is not acceptable since the
asset base of agriculture
in terms on land use is
huge compared to that of
industry and service,” said
Concepcion.
“Philippine agriculture needs scale. We
need clustering to achieve
it. For this to become a reality, titling of land needs
to be cleaned up,” he added.
Through clustering, Concepcion said
farming would be attractive to big companies because they only want to
lease agriculture lands
and not purchase them
Farm clustering
would also serve as the
best complement to the
reforms and programs
being initiated President
Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr.,
as concurrent Department
of Agriculture Secretary,
to enhance food security,
boost the agriculture sector and uplift the lives of
farmers
“It is different if
the President himself is at
the helm of the Agriculture
Department. Also, he has
good people implementing
his vision for the country,
like Agrarian Reform Secretary Estrella and other
government agencies,”
Concepcion said.
“KALAP and the
private sector, composed
of big brothers in the agri
sector, including Dr. Fermin Adriano of FEF, are
always here to offer our
expertise to help the President attain his vision,” he
added.
Through farm
clustering, it would be
easier for the government
to provide assistance to
farmers, such as loans
and farm machinery, because it would deal with
groups rather than individual tillers, FEF representative Dr. Fermin Adriano explained during the meeting
with DAR.
“The process will
pave way for the use of
modern farm machinery
and technologies, thereby
achieving economies of
scale, and allow the development of downstream industries, such as food processing, due to adequate
and reliable supply of raw
materials,” he added.
Other countries
that have implemented
farm clustering, such as
China, Vietnam, Laos, and
Cambodia, all enjoyed
higher yields.
In his opinion piece for the Manila
Times, Adriano batted for
the immediate and proper implementation of the
law condoning the debt of
defaulting agrarian reform
beneficiaries (ARB).
“The challenge
now is to formulate implementing rules and regulations that will facilitate
awarding of individual land
titles. This means the process should not be burdensome for the ARBs,”
Adriano said in his column.
He also called for
the implementation of a
higher land retention ceiling, currently at 5 hectares
for a couple tilling the land
and 3 hectares for an individual cultivator.
“The proposal of the FEF
is to raise it to at least 24
hectares in accordance
with the ceiling provided for the homesteaders
program of the past. If
adopted, this will promote
the rise of Filipino middle-class farmers or ‘family-operated farms,” he
said. PR
