Agriculture Secretary William D. Dar urged businessmen and prospective investors from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to venture into agriculture-related projects in the Philippines.
Dar presented the business opportunities in the country’s agriculture sector to prospective investors during a recent business engagement in Dubai, UAE.
He touted the farm sector’s performance during the Duterte administration and its efforts and programs to modernize and industrialize food production in the country.
He also told the businessmen that the Philippine Department of Agriculture’s (DA) reform agenda is tied to its four pillars of farm consolidation, modernization, industrialization and professionalization of farming.
“We have vast resources of untapped natural resources,” Dar told prospective investors recently.
“We have a skilled labor force, abundant sources of raw materials for manufacturing and a government that supports investors with favorable national policies and incentives.”
Dar told the businessmen that there are opportunities related to the production of coconut, mango, pineapples, bananas, tuna, seaweeds and crabs.
Majority of the possible investments in the agriculture sector involve post-harvest facilities, processing and packaging technologies and research and development.
“The moment has arrived to harness the vast energies and abundance of the Philippine islands for the creation of a new business experience—an experience richer and deeper and more truly a reflection of the goodness and grace of the Filipino spirit,” he said.
“Ours is an incredibly exciting time to be in the field of national development and private enterprise in the Philippines. We look to your trust, confidence and your interest.”
The agriculture chief told prospective investors that the Philippines, which has 3.6 million hectares of coconut plantation, is one of the top exporters of coconut products.
“We now have globally competitive processing technologies to power up production and exports with high quality products,” he said.
Dar said the mango industry is one of the sectors with “promising investment opportunities” while the pineapple industry has an export market opportunity which could grow to as much as $881 million from the current export value of $307 million.
“[Mango is] a largely untapped product with promising investment opportunities in cold storage facilities and research,” he said. “The Philippines was the second largest exporter of fresh pineapples in 2020. There is ample room for investments in the production of more planting materials, post harvest facilities and processing technologies.”
The agriculture chief also noted that the value of the Philippines’s banana export, which currently stands at $1.6 billion, could be doubled with the help of private sector investment.
“We can double that value with adequate investments in research and development.”
Dar said there are investment opportunities in the country’s fisheries sector, particularly in tuna, seaweed and crabs.
“There is a wealth of investment opportunities in the sustainable management of tuna in the Philippines as well as construction of post-harvest and processing facilities for marine fisheries,” he said.
“We exported $99 million worth of crabs to the United States, Japan, Germany and China last year. We can earn much more with sufficient investments in infrastructure and packaging technologies.”
The agriculture chief said the government is keen on implementing three farm-related projects through the public-private partnership (PPP) scheme—integrated dairy project, integrated liberica coffee project and international wholesale food market.
“We have every desire to be a big player in the global coffee industry. We also want to endow the regions with international wholesale markets to give space to our small holder farmers to produce, consolidate, and sell to the market.”
