THE country’s coconut oil mills have agreed to buy copra directly from farmers at P24 per kilogram (kg) to boost farm-gate prices, according to the Department of Agriculture (DA).
Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol said the DA and oil mills reached an agreement to set the buying price during a dialogue held on December 12.
The dialogue was aimed at finding solutions to prop up the mill-gate price of copra, which has fallen below break-even levels.
“The millers have also committed to prevent the buying price from going down at that level [P24/kg] to help coconut farmers nationwide,” Piñol said in a Facebook post published on Wednesday evening.
“The dialogue, initiated by the DA, was aimed at addressing complaints by coconut farmers of very low copra prices,” he added.
Piñol said he has instructed DA regional offices to assist farmers in hauling their copra to the oil mills.
He said the DA, through the Agricultural Credit Policy Council would extend “affordable” credit, which would serve as working capital of organized coconut farmers.
Piñol said the price agreed upon by the DA and oil mills would provide “relief” to farmers who are now incurring losses as copra prices recently fell to as low as P8 per kg, from as high of P40 per kg in previous years.
“Since the transfer of the Philippine Coconut Authority back to the DA three months ago, measures were initiated to address the low copra prices which affect the livelihood of an estimated 4 million farmers all over the country,” he said.
“The direct-selling scheme is expected to provide relief to coconut farmers until the expected increase of copra prices by mid-2019,” Piñol added.
Domestic copra prices declined steeply this year due to oversupply. Also, the glut in vegetable oil in the international market also pulled down the price of coconut oil.
Piñol earlier identified measures that the DA has rolled out to bring back the buying price of copra to “profitable levels.” These include the lifting of the export restriction ban on mature coconuts as well as hiking the coconut methyl ester content of biodiesel to 5 percent, from the current 2 percent.
Preliminary data from the United Coconut Association of the Philippines Inc. (Ucap) showed that the country’s CNO exports in the first half fell by 11.10 percent to 414,089 metric tons, from 465,084 MT, due to lower shipments in the first quarter.
Ucap data also indicated that the country’s CNO exports in the first quarter declined by 31.05 percent to 206,043 MT, from 298,838 MT recorded in the January-to-March period of 2017.
Image credits: Bloomberg
2 comments
Namimili ba kayo ng copra pickup niyo dto sa aurora provinse.
May I know the current pick up price of Copra Cake and provide the location