Insights valuable for their own sector’s development don’t come easy to farmers – such as they don’t realize they have postharvest losses they would gladly not have if they knew how to prevent them.
The above images suggest losses: much loss, from manual vegetable harvesting (top image from the Department of Agriculture (DA)), and minimal loss (bottom, rice combine harvester, photo by Ben Briones[1]). They show the stark difference between non-mechanization and farm mechanization.
How much postharvest losses prevented are we talking about if we mechanize harvesting, drying & processing foods produced in Philippine farms? Executive Director Baldwin Jallorina of the Philippine Center for Postharvest Development & Mechanization (PhilMech) says (Christine Cudis, 01 June 2021, “LGUs Urged To Give Post-Harvest Aid Amid Solon's Ruling[2],” PNA.gov.ph):
In the Philippines, postharvest losses of commodities represent a very significant loss of 10 to 50 percent of production output… This means that 10 percent to 50 percent of all the land, inputs, and labor used to produce the commodities go to waste.
Farmers are wasting up to 50% of their output!
PhilMech is under the DA. To fully mechanize Philippine agriculture, the DA needs billions of pesos. Now comes the “Mandanas Ruling” promising billions of pesos for the local government units (LGUs) starting 2022 – thus, the DA can request additional budget from the LGUs:
The Mandanas ruling states that national taxes for inclusion in the base of the just share of LGUs shall include the national internal revenue taxes enumerated in Section 21 of the National Internal Revenue Code, as amended, collected by the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs; Tariff and customs duties collected by the Bureau of Customs; 50 percent of the value-added taxes collected in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), and 30 percent of all other national taxes collected in ARMM.
Based on computations by the Department of Finance, the ruling will increase the National Tax Allotment of LGUs in 2022 by P234,600,000,000 (P234 Billion).
Considering such, even food security advocate Asis Perez, current Convener of Tugon Kabuhayan (and former Bureau of Fisheries & Aquatic Resources Director), urged LGUs “to focus on the use of additional resources for farmers and fisherfolk to increase their production by investing more in (postharvest) facilities.” He says:
We suggest that 10 percent of the funds or (P234) billion be allocated for (those postharvest facilities) annually, especially in the countryside where most production is happening. The allocation can be adjusted once LGUs reach the desired production and (postharvest) losses targets.
Mr Perez suggests that “10 percent of the funds or P234 billion be allocated for (postharvest facilities) annually, especially in the countryside where most production is happening.” Higher production volumes plus lower production losses “will not only benefit the countryside. Done properly, metropolitan cities will share the benefit in terms of availability of fresh, nutritious food at affordable prices.”
Now then, in 2022, our farmers and fishers will depend much on the DA as well as LGUs for government postharvest expenses on their behalves.@517
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