By Jodi Bustos
Eagle News Service
QUEZON CITY, Philippines (Eagle News)— The United States Department of Agriculture is helping farmers in Mindanao boost their agricultural production, and modernize their systems in hopes of making the region, one of the main food baskets of the country.
Through the Agricultural Cooperative Development International and Volunteers in Overseas Cooperative Assistance (ACDI-VOCA), the US government is working on two four-year agricultural projects in the Philippines focusing on Mindanao.
These are the Mindanao Productivity and Agricultural Commerce and Trade (MINPACT) and the Philippine Cold Chain Project (PCCP).
The Mindanao Productivity and Agricultural Commerce and Trade (MINPACT) will focus on the production of cocoa, coconut, and coffee by working with agricultural producers and farmers to increase their crop yield.
“ACDI/VOCA implements the USDA Food for Progress Mindanao Productivity for Agricultural Commerce and Trade (MinPACT) project. MinPACT increases the incomes of smallholder cocoa, coconut, and coffee farming families in Southern and Western Mindanao,” the ACDI-VOCA said in its website.
It said that the project aims to strengthen “farmers’ capacity and that of other value chain actors for improved farm management, increased productivity, product quality, available services, and access to markets.”
The organization noted that in Mindanao, poverty rates remained high, ranging from 25 to 36 percent.
“Despite Mindanao’s fertile land and rich natural resources, food insecurity is estimated to be over 30 percent—the highest in the country,” it said.
“Increasing farmers’ incomes is an important step toward reducing food insecurity and poverty and sustaining peace in Mindanao,” the organization said in its website.
The project plans to help farmers in the region by improving the competitiveness of coffee cocoa, and coconut value chains, strengthening local capacity and services for improved post-harvest systems and handling practices; and by increasing market access, opportunities, and efficiency of agricultural products and services.
The Philippine Cold Chain Project (PCCP), on the other hand, is a project under USDA Food for Progress program which helps developing countries and emerging democracies modernize and strengthen their agricultural sectors.
PCCP is operating in 260 barangays of the Caraga region.
According to Jeffrey Albanese, Agricultural Attaché of USDA, “PCCP concentrates on cold chain capacity like refrigeration and transportation of perishable and farm products.”
Its goal is to boost the local economy of the region by making it a future breadbasket of the Philippines.
PCCP also works on improving the productivity of selected high-value commodities such as vegetables, bananas, mangoes, livestock, and fisheries.
Mindanao is the chosen area for implementing such agricultural projects because of its fertile land and rich natural resources that have a great capacity to produce varied commercial crops.