In Pampanga, hog feed more expensive than palay

HIGHWAY DRYING Farmers dry their palay along a highway in Bugallon town, Pangasinan province. Their counterparts in Pampanga province are complaining of low buying price of palay, noting that unhusked rice is now cheaper than hog feed. WILLIE LOMIBAO

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga, Philippines — While rice farmers struggle to recover their production costs due to low selling price of palay (unhusked rice), traders are buying darak (rice bran) at a much higher price.

Joseph Canlas, chair of the farmers’ group Alyansa ng mga Magbubukid sa Gitnang Luzon, on Tuesday said farmers in Pampanga province could sell darak, usually used as swine feed, at P12 per kilogram while traders bought palay from them at P6 per kilo.

Canlas said these were the prevailing prices of palay and its byproduct at Barangay Tabuan in Arayat town.

A farmer spends a minimum of P14.79 to produce a kilogram of palay and darak is taken from palay after it is milled.

Farmers in Nueva Ecija, Pangasinan, Isabela and Ilocos Norte provinces said the average farm gate price of palay had dropped to as low as P7 per kilo.

Cash cards for farmers

Several farmers’ groups blamed the rice liberalization law (Republic Act No. 11203) for the flood of cheap imported rice in the local market that leads to the shrinking selling price of palay.

In Nueva Ecija, Agriculture Secretary William Dar on Monday led the distribution of cash cards to over 1,000 local farmers during the launch of the agency’s Expanded Survival and Recovery Assistance (SURE AID) program.

According to Dar, the program provides loan assistance amounting to P15,000 for immediate relief to each rice farmer who is reeling from low buying price of palay.

The loans are payable in eight years and can be availed by farmers tilling not more than 1 hectare of land, Dar said.

Under the program, the Land Bank of the Philippines will administer the P1.5-billion fund from the Department of Agriculture’s Credit Policy Council by releasing the loans whether through direct lending to farmers or through service conduits.

The program intends to serve 100,000 rice farmers nationwide, including 2,000 from Nueva Ecija.

“This is more sustainable than dole outs,” Dar said during the launch.

But Cathy Estavillo, secretary general of the women farmers federation Amihan, said the government’s credit assistance to rice farmers was “not significant.”

Estavillo, who is also spokesperson for Bantay Bigas, said: “SURE AID will trap them further in debt if the buying prices of palay remain at P7 to P10 a kilo.” —Reports from Tonette Orejas and Armand Galang