A field study tour organized by the over 50 member-country Asia Pacific Seeds Association, or APSA, had the latter "very impressed with the milestones achieved by the country in hybrid rice seeds production" as well as the close collaboration among stakeholders in the hybrid rice sector, the Department of Agriculture's Rice Industry Development reported Thursday.

DA-RID Undersecretary Leo Sebastian said this is the first field study tour in the Philippines which stemmed from an invitation by Dr. Frisco Malabanan, who is the current executive committee member from the Philippines who is now with the Masagana Rice Industry Development Program.

Sebastian, who was former chairman of the Special Interest Group on Field Crops, was replaced by the Malaysian delegate starting this year.

APSA is the largest regional seed association in the world with more than 600 members, according to its website.

Headquartered in Bangkok, APSA promotes sustainable agriculture through the development, production and trade of quality seeds within, to and from the Asia-Pacific region, and continues to maintain strong links with a number of key international organizations such as the Food and Agriculture Organization, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the World Trade Organization.

Heidi Gallant, executive director of APSA, provides more insights into what the association means to its members.

Entire spectrum of the seed industry

Its members represent the entire spectrum of the seed industry — both public and private sectors — including national seed associations, government agencies, public and private seed companies, and associate members, which represent organizations outside the Asia region.

Majority of the members are seed enterprises, including breeders, producers, distributors, retailers, exporters and importers.

Countries with the highest number of members are China with 20 percent; India with 19 percent, Pakistan,  seven percent; Bangladesh, seven percent; Japan, seven percent; Thailand, four percent;  South Korea, four percent; and Taipei, four percent.

Sebastian said of the 15 companies that joined the just-concluded field study tour, three were from China and others from India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines.

The APSA study tour was timed with the holding of the 16th National Rice Technology Forum of the private sector group, Rice Board, in Hagonoy, Davao del Sur — which showcased clustered demo farms of hybrid rice companies, soil nutrition companies and digital companies involved in the rice sector, Malabanan said.

Delegates impressed

The delegates, according to Sebastian, were impressed with how the Philippines could pool all seed production companies in one site, as seen during the NRTF tour in Davao Sur.

Malabanan said this was a result of close collaboration between the government and private companies.

They site-visited seed facilities (from drying, cleaning and sacking of seeds) in SL Agritech in Lupon Davao Oriental and had a whole day of farm visits to SL Agritech, Tao Seeds, Longping and BioSeeds farms where they saw actual parental lines (male and female) of the seed companies in their flowering stages.