By Argosy S. Nazareno
Farming is like gambling. You gamble and pour all resources in one bet and pray to the heavens that you will win – when the conditions are right and you are able to harvest, according to a friend who is a farmer.
However, without government support, especially for small-scale farmers who are part of the country’s agricultural manpower, they could decline in number. Some reports indicate that the population of Filipino farmers is aging and shrinking.
Weak government policies and programs, an excessive reliance on agricultural imports, and corruption, are damaging the productivity of the agricultural sector. The government doesn’t pay enough attention to the agricultural sector because they think that they could always import food if the farmers couldn’t produce enough. Boosting imports is not a reliable option. The world food crisis of 2008 taught us that while we may have the money to import rice, rice-exporting countries may not be willing to sell the rice to us.
Past government policies have provided few incentives to farmers which are only focused on yield, without enough consideration for the quality of life of the farmers. Major calamities and disasters can easily wipe out earnings of the small-scale farmers.
What’s worse is that the agriculture programs for the farmers are not encouraging and to top it off, you have corrupt government officials who allegedly created scams that cheated our hardworking farmers.
Another problem is that younger generation are leaving rural areas nationwide, depleting the pool of potential agricultural workers. The problem with farming is that it is associated with poverty. So no farmer would want their children to become farmers. Most rural families instead want their children to pursue jobs in NCR. I think it is now too late to do something about our current farmers and so we must now focus and change the mind-set of the younger generation and make farming appealing for them.
We need more farmers to till the land and restore its vitality. We need them to plant seeds that will produce an amazing variety of crops which when harvested will feed every Filipino. But the problem is, we do not pay attention to the farmers. We have taken agriculture for granted.
(I greet my wife, Clarice P. Nazareno, a Happy Birthday. I wish you all the best and I love you! For comments and suggestions, kindly send an email at argoclaraye@gmail.com.)
Farming is like gambling. You gamble and pour all resources in one bet and pray to the heavens that you will win – when the conditions are right and you are able to harvest, according to a friend who is a farmer.
However, without government support, especially for small-scale farmers who are part of the country’s agricultural manpower, they could decline in number. Some reports indicate that the population of Filipino farmers is aging and shrinking.
Weak government policies and programs, an excessive reliance on agricultural imports, and corruption, are damaging the productivity of the agricultural sector. The government doesn’t pay enough attention to the agricultural sector because they think that they could always import food if the farmers couldn’t produce enough. Boosting imports is not a reliable option. The world food crisis of 2008 taught us that while we may have the money to import rice, rice-exporting countries may not be willing to sell the rice to us.
Past government policies have provided few incentives to farmers which are only focused on yield, without enough consideration for the quality of life of the farmers. Major calamities and disasters can easily wipe out earnings of the small-scale farmers.
What’s worse is that the agriculture programs for the farmers are not encouraging and to top it off, you have corrupt government officials who allegedly created scams that cheated our hardworking farmers.
Another problem is that younger generation are leaving rural areas nationwide, depleting the pool of potential agricultural workers. The problem with farming is that it is associated with poverty. So no farmer would want their children to become farmers. Most rural families instead want their children to pursue jobs in NCR. I think it is now too late to do something about our current farmers and so we must now focus and change the mind-set of the younger generation and make farming appealing for them.
We need more farmers to till the land and restore its vitality. We need them to plant seeds that will produce an amazing variety of crops which when harvested will feed every Filipino. But the problem is, we do not pay attention to the farmers. We have taken agriculture for granted.
(I greet my wife, Clarice P. Nazareno, a Happy Birthday. I wish you all the best and I love you! For comments and suggestions, kindly send an email at argoclaraye@gmail.com.)
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