The Duterte administration has announced its intention to cut the national poverty rate to 13 percent by the time the President steps down from office in 2022. To achieve this, the government must be able to reduce poverty incidence by 1.5 percentage points annually. This means lifting around 1 million Filipinos out of poverty every year.
This poverty-reduction goal would not be attainable if the national government neglects the agriculture sector. The latest available data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) indicated that farmers and fishermen continue to live in the poorest basic sectors of Philippine society. Data from the PSA showed that poverty incidence for farmers and fishermen were at 34.3 percent and 34 percent, respectively.
Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez, a former chief of the Department of Agriculture (DA), said earlier the government must focus on the countryside, as the “severely poor” are mostly found in rural areas. Unfortunately, other officials do not seem to have the same mindset, as indicated by the national government’s spending priorities for 2018. Instead of getting a hefty raise in its 2018 budget, the DA’s allocation was pegged at P52.4 billion.
The DA had been hoping to get a budget of P213 billion for 2018. While P52.4 billion is not exactly peanuts, the DA’s budget for next year would only allow the agency to sustain its existing activities, projects and programs. It would not give the department enough elbowroom to put in place new initiatives that would boost the production of other crops. It would not even enable the DA to significantly improve existing programs and projects.
What’s strange is that the President himself has approved the initial budget proposal when it was presented to the Cabinet, according to Budget Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno. Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol had said earlier that the President had promised him a budget that is on a par with what is being given to the departments of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and Education. The P52.4 billion approved for the DA is way below the P643.3 billion given to the DPWH for next year.
Diokno said the hike in the DPWH’s budget is in line with the Duterte administration’s goal of ushering in the so-called golden age of infrastructure in the Philippines. There is nothing wrong with the government’s infrastructure push, as it is obviously the fastest route to providing job opportunities to skilled laborers. But the government must also accord the agriculture sector the same importance it has given to the DPWH in its spending priorities.
Unless economic managers have made up their minds to just let the Philippines buy all its produce and food from abroad, there should be not let up in government efforts to strengthen the agriculture sector. The Philippines continues to lag behind its neighbors in Southeast Asia in terms of farm exports. Filipino farmers are also getting old and many young Filipinos who should be taking the place of their parents would rather go abroad than work in the farms.
Investing in the agriculture sector is not a onetime solution but the rewards will be worth the cost. Government support must be sustained if the Duterte administration is serious about lifting millions of Filipinos out of poverty and ensure food security. The President and our lawmakers should listen to Piñol and increase the DA’s budget for 2018.