Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol and sugar planters are appealing to the Senate to scrap plans to slash the Sugar Industry Development Act (Sida) fund next year by 75 percent to P500 million from P2 billion this year.
Piñol confirmed that the Sida fund of the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) would be slashed by three-fourths due to underspending.
The SRA is an attached government-owned and -controlled corporation of the Department of Agriculture (DA).
“I am appealing that the SRA be given a chance to retain the P2-billion [funding],” he said in an interview with reporters on Tuesday afternoon.
“We are already addressing [the issue],” he added.
Sen. Cynthia A. Villar disclosed to sugar planters in her visit to San Carlos City, Negros Occidental, last Monday that the Sida fund would be cut by 75 percent.
Piñol said one of the problems of the SRA was the implementation of its socialized loans, as farmers had a hard time in complying with the requirements needed to avail themselves of the credit portfolio. Furthermore, the SRA also had problems with its farm machineries program, according to Piñol.
“We are addressing that, in fact the bidding of the SRA’s farm machineries will be conducted by the DA Central Office. I do not know if they are afraid to bid out but I told them to give it to a more experienced office,” he said.
The Confederation of Sugar Producers (Confed) urged lawmakers to rectify the Sida fund cut and revert it to the original P2 billion mandated by the law.
Confed Chairman Nicholas Ledesma said the SRA was not only able to fully utilize the Sida funds allocated for socialized credit.
However, Ledesma echoed Piñol’s statement that the “stringent” process in availing the credit fund was “difficult for small farmers to access.”
“With the recent abolition of Philsucor [Philippine Sugar Corp.], we are pressed to appeal that socialized credit availability must be made more simpler for small farmers and agrarian-reform beneficiaries that comprise almost 90 percent of sugar producers and for whom the Sida law was intended to make the sugar industry more competitive,” Ledesma said in a news statement issued on Tuesday.
Ledesma said slashing the Sida fund would have a “drastic” effect on the sugar industry as it could slow down the government’s plan to mechanize the sector.
Ledesma added that the budget for the research and development “must be kept intact as this is necessary for the industry’s sustainability.”
“We appeal as well to SRA to be more aggressive in program implementations and to create a desk that will solely work on Sida and how to make this more accessible to our industry stakeholders. In addition, we see the need for the creation of an oversight committee to see to it that programs are indeed workable and addressing the present needs of the farmers,” he said.
“We have suffered enough in the past two years and this move will further dampen our situation. We strongly appeal to our solons to seek a review of the budget and give the industry our due to make it globally competitive and sustainable,” he added.
The budget cut will have a drastic effect on the industry’s tract to hasten mechanization as a priority for this year, as well.