‘Minda’ farmers enjoy better farmgate prices

The Department of Agriculture on Monday disclosed that most Mindanao rice farmers — who have just started harvesting their wet season crop — are enjoying high farmgate prices for fresh produce at P21 to P23 per kilogram.

Reports obtained by DAILY TRIBUNE submitted to the DA's central office showed that farmgate prices for fresh palay in Region 9 as of 5 October is at P20 to P22 per kilogram and for the 160 variety — a preferred seed by farmers and the market — fresh palay prices at the farmgate are at P21.50 to P24.

The records also indicated harvest completed was only 20 percent.

For Northern Mindanao, the farmgate price is at P20 to P23 per kilogram and harvest completed is at 25 percent while for Region 13, the farmgate price of fresh palay is P21 to P23 and harvest completed is just at 33 percent.

For all three regions, harvest is expected to peak only by the end of October until November.

The increase in palay prices hampered the National Food Authority to buy from the farmers even if it's buying prices have been raised from P16 to 19 per kilogram for wet palay and P19 to P23 for dry palay.

In line with this, the DA regional field offices were asked to coordinate and help the NFA to explore ways to enjoin farmers to sell their palay so that the NFA could beef up its buffer stocks.

The DA recommended that for the NFA to buy from the farmers it should be channeled through the clustered irrigators associations, particularly those which have been receiving financial and inputs interventions from the DA, to convince their members to set aside a portion of their produce so NFA could buy at its new buying prices, to help shore up government's buffer stocks.