• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
With 84 to 86 percent rice sufficiency in Negros Occidental, Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson still wants to increase the rice production of farmers from four to six metric tons per hectare, which according to Provincial Agriculturist Dina Genzola, is attainable maybe by 2026 onwards, if all the agricultural inputs needed are provided.
Lacson, who led the distribution of 246 sacks of certified good rice seeds to more than 200 farmers in E.B. Magalona, Ilog, Manapla, and Cadiz City, who were affected by natural calamities, said “through this, we hope to really increase our rice production to 6MT, or even more.”
The Negros Occidental Seedgrowers Agriculture Cooperative and the Negros First Integrated Agricultural Center donated the rice seeds, as facilitated by the OPA, in line with its “Binhi sang Probinsya” under the Abanse Negrense program.
Despite the occurrence of calamities every year, Lacson said the rice farmers and rice seed growers did not surrender.
He noted the production of rice farmers in Bago did not drop despite the El Niño weather phenomenon. In fact, he added, there was a minimal increase, the governor said.
Lacson also turned over P250,000 financial assistance to the Amia Village Organic Farmer Association in Pontevedra and Tampalon Rainfed Upland Farmers Association in Kabankalan City.
Because of our production, food security is still okay. Walang gutom (no hunger), Lacson said, as he stressed the need for higher rice production.
Asked on the target of 6MT of rice production for one hectare, Genzola admitted that “it may not be instant.”
But the target is 2025 to 2027, she added.
With all the agricultural inputs, technology, irrigation, and all the components in rice production, also in partnership with Philippine Rice Research Institute, Department of Agriculture, and National Irrigation Administration, among others, we could probably attain it, Genzola further said.
The challenge, she stressed, is the adverse effects of calamities.*
