The Department of Agriculture (DA) is accelerating its shift toward data-driven farm planning and climate preparedness as it races to protect food production from a possible El Niño episode expected to peak by November, while taking advantage of falling fuel and fertilizer prices to boost crop output before dry conditions intensify.

Agriculture Secretary Francisco P. Tiu Laurel Jr. directed the agency to move beyond reactive measures and adopt a more integrated approach to food security, where production, weather forecasts, storage, logistics, and market demand are managed through real-time data to improve decision-making.

Speaking during the DA’s flag ceremony on Monday, Tiu Laurel said the agency must sustain the gains achieved during the first half of the year by focusing on faster implementation, stronger coordination in the field, and better planning.

He said the department now has more time to prepare for the expected El Niño than it did during the previous dry spell, giving agriculture officials an opportunity to put mitigation measures in place before weather conditions worsen.

“Preparedness prevents a challenge from becoming a crisis, and a crisis from deteriorating into a catastrophe. That must be our guiding principle in the months ahead,” Tiu Laurel said.

The agriculture chief said improving food security will require treating the country’s food system as a single interconnected network rather than addressing production, storage, and distribution separately.

He pointed to onions and carrots as examples of commodities where domestic production is already sufficient but post-harvest losses and inadequate cold storage continue to force the country to rely on imports.

According to Tiu Laurel, expanding cold storage facilities, blast freezers, and logistics infrastructure would allow locally produced crops to be stored longer and distributed more efficiently, reducing waste and dependence on imported food.

He also instructed DA regional offices to identify each province’s top agricultural and fisheries commodities, estimate production capacity, and quantify post-harvest losses to guide future investments in storage, processing, and cold-chain facilities.

The department also plans to accelerate irrigation projects, water impounding systems, and the construction of small farm reservoirs that can support both crop production and inland fisheries, providing farmers with additional income sources during dry periods.

Tiu Laurel said current market conditions provide an opportunity to increase farm production, with fuel prices easing and fertilizer costs falling significantly from previous highs. Fertilizer prices have dropped from around $930 per metric ton to about $450, while local retail prices are expected to return to near pre-war levels of P1,600 to P2,000 per bag by August.

The lower production costs, he said, should encourage farmers to maximize planting before El Niño conditions begin affecting water supplies later this year.