Piñol not giving up hopes for higher 2018 budget
More than a week after President Rodrigo Duterte submitted the proposed 2018 national budget to Congress, Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol is still yet to give up hopes on getting a higher budget next year, even citing the possibility of tapping other sources of additional funds.
"I've talked to some congressmen (about granting Department of Agriculture a higher budget for next year). They are very cooperative," Piñol said in an interview with reporters.
To recall, Piñol said before he will not settle for a budget lower than R120 billion for next year, and then later on adjusted it to at least R80 billion.
But in the proposed budget submitted by Duterte, only R54.2 billion is supposed to go to the DA in 2018.
Piñol implied that this will not be enough, saying that for Farm-to-Market Road (FMR) projects alone, the agency will need at least R20 billion a year.
"I told them (congressmen) that there are still 13,000 kilometers backlog in the FMR. That would cost R130 billion in total. The president wants that to be finished during his term," the DA chief said.
The rest of agency's 2018 budget, according to him, will go to DA's Production Loan Easy Access (PLEA) Program, a R50-billion loan program for farmers and fishers to be rolled out next year.
"We are looking at other funding sources like the funds that will supposedly go to Barangay Elections so the budget could reach to R80 billion," Piñol said.
According to him, the government is also working towards the rationalization of road projects.
As of now, various government agencies like DA, Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), Department of Tourism, among others, have their own FMR projects.
"Our idea is that there should be one agency implementing the road rationalization network program and that is DA," Piñol said.
The R3.767-trillion proposed budget was presented by DBM Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno and approved by President Duterte during the 16th Cabinet meeting in Malacanang on July 3.
In FY 2018, DA has been allocated exactly R54.2 billion, a 32.5 percent increase from this year’s DA budget, to expand by 500,000 hectares the total irrigated harvest area using hybrid seeds.
"This will translate to 19.79 million metric tons (MT) of palay yield, 1.22 million MT more than this year’s target. The DA budget will also finance the construction of an additional 1,179 kilometers of farm-to-market roads to link farmer producers to market centers, opening up economic opportunities for the rural sector," DBM said.
Furthermore, the R40.9-billion allocation for the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) will support the agricultural production of Filipino farmers with the development, restoration, repair and rehabilitation of irrigation systems nationwide.
These facilities will service 564,000 farmers, and will irrigate 582,898 and 613,193 hectares of land in the dry and wet season, respectively.
Rounding off the agricultural provisions for the 2018 proposed budget is the R10.3-billion allocation for DAR.
The said funds will fast-track land distribution to agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) and ensure land tenure security for our farmers.
Of the R10.3 billion DAR budget, R1.1 billion has been set aside for the extension of the Mindanao Sustainable Agrarian and Agriculture Development Project to spur agribusiness and agroforestry programs in the region.
“With the early submission of the proposed budget, the DBM is confident that Congress will have enough time to thoroughly study, improve, and finalize the budget for next year," DBM said.