Poor governance, not globalization
weakens RP's agriculture, says economist

By DR. GELIA CASTILLO
National Scientist

A Filipino economist shifted the blame for the country's food production woes away from globalization to poor governance and outmoded agriculture policies.

“It is the domestic policies and institutional bottlenecks, not the global environment for agricultural trade, which cause the country's weak agricultural economy”, says Dr. Arsenio Balisacan, director of the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization—Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Studies and Research in Agriculture or SEAMEO-SEARCA based in Los Baños.

Balisacan said that this situation explains much of the country's comparatively weak performance in food production, employment creation, agricultural trade and poverty reduction.

Poor governance also weakened the sector's capacity to respond efficiently to urbanization influences.  This is manifested especially through changes in consumption patterns and land use owing to the combined impact of population growth, rising incomes, and developments in information technology, he added.

The “business as usual” approach to governing agriculture and the rural sector needs to be abandoned. This should give way in favor of more aggressive governance reforms and strategic investment aimed at raising agricultural productivity and sustaining gains in farm incomes, reducing the “cost of doing business” in rural areas and taking advantage of opportunities for growth offered by globalization.

“Rice, the population's staple food, has become more expensive in the Philippines than in other developing East Asian countries, owing principally to the government's ill-advised self-sufficiency objective,” he said.

Low agricultural productivity combined with a trade policy that restricts the importation of food products are raising food prices. What is bad about this is that the high cost of food hurts especially the poor sector of the economy, majority of which are the farmers, Balicasan argued.

He believes that liberalizing the rice trade would improve the welfare of the poor, especially the “landless workers and urban consumers”.   This may pose substantial reduction in income and labor displacement among those in the rice sector – but only for a short term.   Rice trade liberalization “combined with public investment in productivity-enhancing support services, particularly research and development and Irrigation, is a win-win proposition.”

Dr. Balisacan presented a paper entitled “Philippine Agriculture in an Urbanizing and Globalizing World” in the National Academy of Science and Technology's 26th Annual Scientific Meeting July 14 and 15 held at the Manila Hotel,

The annual event focused on the theme “On Being and Becoming: Where We Are and Where We want to Be,” which discussed pressing issues such as church and society, humanities, education, economy, agriculture, natural resources, and health research and practice.

The ASM is a forum for presentation of new scientific and technological findings, research and information by individual scientists, led by NAST members. 

NAST is the country's highest advisory body to the government on S&T and related matters.  It is also mandated to recognize outstanding achievements and provide incentives to those engaged in S&T research.