DA eyes 100% rice sufficiency, expects 28 MMT of rice and corn output in 2013

Expected production of the country’s two staples, rice and corn, may reach a combined 28 million metric tons (MMT) by 2013, says the updated production timeline released by the Department of Agriculture during the budget hearing last week. Rice is estimated to account for 20.04 MT of this total, with corn making up 8.75 million MT. In its report to the Congressional hearing on the 2013 budget, the Department said that rice production was at 94 percent sufficiency in 2011 . “We are eyeing 100 percent sufficiency [on rice] next year,” said Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala, who underscored the importance of having a bigger budget to accommodate more sufficiency programs in 2013 and beyond. "We will pursue the food staples sufficiency program to attain 100 percent rice self-sufficiency by the end of 2013," he said. The Agriculture Department is asking for as much as P74.1 billion to step up productivity programs not only for rice and corn but for other crops and related-infrastructures. The Department is looking at as much as 17.8 million MT in rice output for 2012, trimming the target output from 18.4 million MT. “I still believe we can meet the target. We’re hoping to catch up with production even with reports of thousands of metric tons of palay [lost] due to typhoons,” Alcala said, adding that farmers are still planning to conduct a third cropping. If the 2012 target is achieved, farmers will have to increase output by 2.2 million tons next year to hit the 2013 palay production goal. Of the P74.1 billion proposed budget for the DA in 2013, about P28.75 billion or almost one-third will go towards irrigation. Meanwhile, corn output is projected to reach 8.75 million MT in 2013. The government is setting its sights on producing 5.72 million MT of yellow corn and 2.69 million MT of white corn. In 2012, the Department sees corn output reaching 7.46 million MT, 7 percent higher than the 2011 total. Should production targets for the country’s two staple crops are met in 2012, the Department will see to it that excess output in 2013 will be exported to other countries. “We are really eager to export specialty rice to the US, Middle East and the Europe,” Alcala said. — BM, GMA News