Agri food exports to drop this year on lower production

The country’s agricultural food exports will further slide this year amid declining production of raw materials.

The Philippine Food Processors and Exporters Organization Inc. (PhilFoodex) said agricultural exports for 2019 may decline by 20 percent following the rising cost of materials for agriculture produce due to lack of supply.

“I think we will still be experiencing a deficit in our trade balance between other countries and definitely the widening gap of agriculture exports and imports will be experienced,” PhilFoodex president Bobby Amores told reporters.

“We are hoping that the production of raw materials will be normal, but because of certain issues on pest diseases and climate change, we can only hope that it will be experiencing a flat growth or a slightly lower growth compared to last year,” he added.

Last year, export sales of agriculture and food reached $6.04 billion.

PhilFoodex is the leading food industry association in the country composed of micro, small, medium and large scale food manufacturers and exporters.

In particular, mango exports will be down again because of production problem and late start of the season, impacting the output of both fresh and processed mango products.

“Our coconut products are also on a slump so you can expect total agri exports to be lower by 20 percent because of the impact of coconut, copra prices which are below P20 per kilogram now,” Amores said.

Further, the Philippines is also expecting short supplies of banana and pineapples as well because of climate change and diseases.

Coconut oil exports account for 20 percent of total outbound agriculture shipments, while fresh bananas also account for the same percentage. Other exports include pineapples and mangoes.

“The growing demand [in the global market] is there, but we are still having a problem because we have the market but we don’t have enough supply,” Amores said.

“Now is the time for our farmers to be looking at the medium and long term which we have been asking them to start intercropping cacao, coffee which are also good crops,” he added.