September 4, 2014

Manila, Philippines—Approximately two million small farmers and fishers are expected to directly benefit from a new rural development project of the Department of Agriculture (DA) from which bulk of the fund is sourced from World Bank (WB) loan.

The said project will be implemented by the DA’s Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP) which is ready to be launched in October this year and will start full implementation after the loan has been approved by the World Bank recently.

DA-PRDP,a six-year rural development project worth over P27.5 billion will be funded through a loan from World Bank worth P20.56 B, and P7-B counterpart from the Government of the Philippines (GOP) and Local Government Units (LGUs).

Agriculture Secretary Proceso J. Alcala said that PRDP aims to increase rural incomes and enhance farm and fishery productivity in the rural areas throughout the country. This will be achieved by supporting smallholders and fishers to sustainably increase their marketable surpluses, and by improving access to markets.

He added that the Project will benefit producers, entrepreneurs, and over 22 million rural dwellers through installation of infrastructures like farm-to-market roads, postharvest facilities, fishery-related infrastructures, and communal irrigation systems, among others that will support the value chain of agricultural commodities.

Likewise, PRDP will provide technical and marketing assistance to small farmers and fishers to boost their incomes and help them become more competitive both in the local and global markets.

Alcala explained that the DA will partner with LGUs and the private sector in providing key interventions in the rural areas all over the country.

“While the sub-projects will be proposed by the LGUs, there will be less chance of misspending of government funds as we will utilize technologies that will ensure the viability of particular sub-projects before implementation.

A value chain analysis will be conducted to assess the viability of sub-projects that will be implemented under PRDP.

For this year, a total of P5.8 B has already been allotted by the PRDP to fund infrastructures and marketing support. Under the project, the LGUs and the GOP will each counterpart 10% of the project cost, and the remaining 80% will be funded under the loan from WB.

PRDP also highlights the utilization of transparency and monitoring tool—geo-tagging—as a measure to prevent corruption and fabricated sub-projects as well as facilitate supervision of the sub-projects’ progress, especially in remote and conflict-stricken areas.

The geo-tagging innovation, which was developed under the DA’s Mindanao Rural Development Program in 2011, has received international awards and citations as an effective tool to combat fraud in project implementation.

Aside from the loan, PRDP will also receive P287 million grant from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) as part of the financing package to support conservation and protection of selected coastal and marine protected areas.

Included in the priority areas for conservation are: Tayabas Bay in Quezon Province; Green Island Bay in Palawan; Ticao Pass in Sorsogon-Masbate province; Guimaras, in Iloilo; Danajon Bank in Bohol; and Guian Coast in Easter Samar.

Alcala also said that, while the PRDP will be implemented nationwide, a major focus will be directed to the rehabilitation of the agriculture and fishery sectors in areas affected by typhoon Yolanda and 7.2-magnitude earthquake in Visayas last year.

Aside from improving incomes and productivity in the rural areas, the PRDP also aims to improve climate adaptation and resiliency of farmers especially that climate change is one of biggest issues that the agriculture sector is facing nowadays.