Gov't agencies ready to aid farmers under ‘Masagana’ program

THE NATIONAL Irrigation Administration (NIA) said four government agencies will work together to support farmers under the Masagana Rice Industry Development Program of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr.

During the Laging Handa briefing Monday, NIA acting administrator Eduardo Guillen said the program is a convergence effort of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) and the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).

Guillen said the Masagana rice program targets to help Filipino farmers in climate change adaptation and make their farms more resilient to harsh weather conditions.

In this partnership, he said one of the responsibilities of the DPWH is to facilitate water management by connecting small water-impounding projects to irrigation facilities.

“On the part of (the) NIA, our suggestion is to reposition our production. For example, during the dry season, we know that the yield of the hybrid is high, so we will teach hybrid production in the dry season. And then in the wet season, we will see, we should release water…So those are the systems,” Guillen said.

He said the program aims to have one irrigation cooperative per town by clustering all irrigator associations in each municipality.

“So that we can have economies of scale production and to easily deliver the right aid or service or farm inputs to them,” he added.

Meanwhile, Guillen is optimistic that the government’s target of at least 97 percent rice self-sufficiency is achievable by 2028.

“We can provide the right assistance or inputs to our farmers. Like in the case of hybrid rice, we know that our farmers can't be convinced to plant hybrid rice sometimes because the input is expensive, it needs more water and more fertilizer,” he said.

Guillen said that with the assistance of seeds and fertilizers under the National Rice Program, the government will be able to convince farmers to do hybrid planting during the dry season. (Ferdinand Patinio)