SAMAR RICE SELF-SUFFICIENCY: Optimizing the Full Potential of a Granary

28Sep10

(delivered before the plenary in the House of Representatives, August 23, 2010)

Mr. Speaker:

I rise on a matter of personal and collective privilege.

Seen on news today is the problem on rice faced by our country. Reports say that we had imported so much rice in anticipation of crop underproduction. There is a forecast that our country will experience shortage of the staple food as palay output slid by 10.24 percent this semester. (Manila Bulletin, August 16)

Likewise, we’ve heard Sec. Procy Alcala presenting President Noynoy Aquino’s roadmap of zero importation of rice three years from now.

I agree with the President that the Philippines must be rice-sufficient.

With a burgeoning Filipino population expected to hit the 100 million mark by 2015, we cannot afford a large-scale rice shortage.

With three babies born every minute, we cannot forever rely on temporary solutions like importation of rice.

Mr. Speaker and my colleagues, I rise to present the Island of Samar as one of the feasible solutions.

Samar, the country’s third largest island, has 25 major river systems yet, ironically its rice fields are thirsting for irrigation water.

Most of these rivers have never been tapped to irrigate rice fields, the very reason why rice productivity in the three Samar provinces – Samar, Northern Samar and Eastern Samar – has remained very low- with a combined sufficiency level of only 56% with Northern Samar posting the highest at 62%, followed by Eastern Samar with 55% and Samar with 51%.

Compared to other islands in Eastern Visayas — Leyte and Biliran have six national irrigation systems — where 74.74% of irrigable lands already have irrigation facilities, only 22.02% of irrigable lands in Samar Island are irrigated.

For the past decades, the Island of Samar was not a priority to irrigation projects, perhaps, because it is perceived to lie along the path of typhoons. (pagasa data)

But Samar has the potential waiting to be tapped.

In fact, former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo implemented the on-going HELP FOR CATUBIG AGRICULTURAL ADVANCEMENT PROGRAM (HCAAP) in Northern Samar. This  is going to be the first major irrigation system in the Island.

With the HCAAP, agricultural production will increase in Northern Samar through the provision of irrigation facilities, flood protection and extension of road network, strengthening the productive activities with the development of agricultural support services and institution, and enhanced public health through schistosomiasis control and provision of basic social services. (comparative data)

A couple of years ago, the Philippines had a rice shortfall of 1.8 Million Metric Tons. In our study, if Samar would only be irrigated, we can increase our (rice) production by an additional 500,000 metric tons. This means that if the irrigable land in Samar (Island) would totally be irrigated, it will greatly help our country’s rice production.

This is the reason why I rise today to ask the National Government to optimize the potential of Samar. The Regional Offices of the NEDA and DA-NIA have prepared a project proposal on irrigation, providing Farm to Market Roads, machineries, post-harvest facilities, seed system development, training, extension and information, among others.

The outcomes of the project are:

Within an implementation period of three to four years, the project will increase the irrigated land from 11,223 ha to 50,959 ha. The project will likewise increase the average yield from 2.82 to 4.5 mt/hectare per cropping for irrigated areas, and from 1.81 to 3.0 mt/hectare per cropping for non-irrigated areas; and significantly stabilize rice output levels. Consequently, it will help to achieve Millennium Development Goal Number 1 or to ERADICATE EXTREME POVERTY & HUNGER.

	Without the Project	UPON COMPLETION OF PROJECT
Total Rice Area	81,006 ha	81,006 HA
Irrigated	11,223 ha	50,959 ha
Average Yield per hectare	2.82 MT	4.5 MT
Total Production of Rainfed Areas (@ 3 MT/ha)	± 180,000 MT annually
Total Production of Irrigated Rice Area (@ 4.5 MT/ha)	687,946 MT annually

Notes:

Additional Rice Yield Upon Project Completion (expanded irrigated area-existing irrigated area) x 3 x 455 MT per ha	536,436 MT/year
Rice yield in rainfed areas without project	108770 MT/year
Rice yield in rainfed areas with project	180,282 MT/year
Additional Ricefield in Rainfed Areas	71,512 MT / year

Mr. Speaker, this representation has just shown you the additional yield we can harness from the Island of Samar. Shown in the matrix is the rice land that we can still irrigate for the other provinces in Region 8 to augment rice production. If all the potential irrigable lands in the Region can be irrigated, we can expect an additional 766,057 MT metric tons of rice that Region 8 can contribute to the country annually.

Province	Existing Irrigated Land	Potential Irrigable Land
Leyte	38,076 ha	52,236 ha
S. Leyte	5,996 ha	6,630 ha
Biliran	3,449 ha	5,664 ha
Samar	2,553 ha	15,782 ha
E. Samar	4,117 ha	18,723 ha
N. Samar	4,553 ha	16, 454 ha
TOTAL	58, 744 ha	115, 489 ha
Yield (4.5 mt per ha)	793,044 MT	1,559,101.50 MT

Increment of 766,057.50 MT / year

It can be remembered that a few years ago, our government bought rice abroad and sold it locally at very low prices to make it affordable for our people. The discrepancy was subsidized by the government. If we do the math, the money that went to rice subsidy could have been better used to fund land irrigation projects which offers a long-lasting solution to stabilize our country’s rice production. Needless to say that investing in irrigation is the more sustainable way of solving our rice problem.

Samar may have been considered a liability in the past. Taken collectively, the indicators of the regional data are adversely affected by those coming from Samar due to the earlier mentioned reasons.

This time, however, I see high hopes as I ask the support of the National Government to improve our situation by providing the much-needed infrastructure and help mechanisms, thus making  Samar and the whole Easter Visayas an asset in the realization of President Aquino’s roadmap of becoming a rice-sufficient country.

Thank you Mr. Speaker. Thank you my colleagues.

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