Tabuk City corn farmers rue tumbling prices

By Estanislao Albano, Jr.

TABUK CITY, Kalinga – Rolando Bangibang, a village councilor, said that his fellow farmers in barangay Cudal who harvested and sold their corn crops up to three weeks ago wore wide smiles on their faces.
“But those who are harvesting now have grim looks on their faces,” the barangay official said.
The reason the mood changed among corn farmers in Cudal and in all other corn-producing places in the city is that starting the first week of March, the prices of corn which hit an all time high of P14.50 per kilo for dried grains in mid-February started to decline steadily.
When the ZZW checked on April 1, the prices have gone down to P10.50 per kilo for dried and P6.50 for undried.
Bangibang said that those who harvested early were able to pay their loans with the village cooperative but that on the other hand, you cannot see those who are harvesting now settling their obligations with the lending institution.
He said that most of the farmers of Cudal borrow their farming capital which averages P25,000.00 per hectare from the village cooperative.
City alderman Martinez Vicente, a resident of barangay Calaccad where like in Cudal 90 percent of the population depend on their cornfields for their sustenance, said that at the current price, corn farmers are lucky if they break even.
“At P10.50 per kilo, you could profit if your harvest is good but if not, then you could even lose considering the high cost of farm inputs and labor nowadays,” Vicente said.
Martinez, however, does not blame local traders for the adverse developments saying that it is the big millers in Isabela with whom the former do business who are setting the prices.
Evelyn Barroga, provincial manager of the National Food Authority (NFA), said that the downtrend in corn prices is caused by the near simultaneous harvest in most of the corn-producing areas in the country.
She informed that with the expected effect of the peaking of the harvest nationwide on the prices of the staple, the NFA is ready to purchase from farmers the moment prices in the market equals or becomes lower than the government support price of P10.40 per kilo.
“For Kalinga, we have P10M allocation for this cropping season. That is equivalent to 12,000 bags. If the prices in the market continue to dip, we could request for augmentation. Last year, we bought 50,000 bags,” Barroga said.
“We are ready to buy whenever the outside prices become lower than the government support price. We are ready to come to the rescue of the farmers,” Barroga added.
In the case of rice, Barroga informed that her office has a budget of P142M to purchase the staple from Kalinga farmers in 2011.
Regarding the complaint of local rice farmers that the quality standards of the agency is too astringent, Barroga said that they have no choice “because we are using government funds for the procurement.”
“The high standards is normal in the existence of the NFA because of the policy of stocking the rice as buffer. It takes at least six months before we dispose of the stock unlike private traders who have brisk turnover of stocks” Barroga said.**