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P5M full subsidy for rice farmers
By KIT BAGAIPO
Provincial
lawmakers passed a resolution on Friday granting P5-million
for the full subsidy of rice growers in the province.
Vice
Gov. Julius Caesar Herrera, chair of the Sangguniang Panlalawigan
(SP) agriculture committee, steered the provincial board in
requesting Gov. Erico Aumentado to source out funding for
said subsidy.
The
financial assistance to farmers will be used to buy high yielding
varieties characteristic of hybrid and certified rice seeds.
The
vice governor, while suggesting use of idle arable lands for
rice production, said that a full government subsidy for certified
hybrid seeds to rice growers can propel Bohol's rice sufficiency.
Presently,
the province is only 83-percent rice sufficient, per records
of the Bureau of Agriculture Statistics (BAS).
Despite
the undersupply, Bohol is still shipping some of its palay
and milled rice to Cebu and other neighboring provinces.
The
governor however imposed regulations last week by issuing
an executive order to control rice shipments. This is to make
sure that the province will have enough supply during the
lean months.
Records
at the BAS show that hybrid rice is only grown in some 220
hectares in Bohol.
Herrera
said he wants it expanded to at least 3,000 hectares in irrigated
farmlands.
As
to the seeds, the increased rice production would bring in
1,280 more bags of hybrid seeds from the current 3,720 bags.
Certified seeds will also be increased by about 19,000 bags
from 14,212 bags.
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If
the subsidy plan is successful, Herrera foresees a 103.9%
self sufficiency in rice by next year.
According
to provincial agriculturist Liza Quirog, the provincial
government is currently subsidizing P1,000 per bag of
hybrid rice seeds. The farmers pay the remaining amount
of the bag.
Under
the Bohol Seeds Assistance Program, certified rice growers
are given P440 as incentive per bag, plus 2 bags of
organic fertilizer.
The
biggest yield for hybrid rice in Bohol is 200 cavans
in a cropping season.
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OTHER
PROPOSAL
Bohol
Poverty Reduction Management Office (BPRMO) head Antonieto
Pernia, who is a member of the technical working group for
rice (TWG), recommended that instead of a subsidy, farmer
organizations will be given an initial fund which the farmers
will pay after harvest.
Pernia
bared during the weekly "The Governor Reports" that
the TWG is recommending that the subsidy does not go directly
to the farmers but be coursed through farmer organizations
and cooperatives.
He
also disclosed that the TWG is studying the possibility of
a subsidy for fertilizer and technical inputs for the farmers.
Meanwhile,
Aumentado said Friday during his "The Governor Reports"
the possibility of imposing higher taxes for arable yet idle
lands. He said he asked the DENR and DA to do an inventory
on these idle and arable lands.
He
also said there is already a conscious effort to limit the
biofuel support production to only to 18-percent so "we
do not unnecessarily waste arable and idle lands where rice
can be grown."
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