Pangilinan bats for cluster farming

RETURNING senator Francis Pangilinan pushed for "cluster farming" to increase the income of small farmers and fishermen through the expansion of their production and access to bigger markets.

During an open forum on Saturday, Pangilinan raised the importance of land reform, such as stopping the conversion of irrigated agricultural lands and supporting "true" agrarian reform.

But Pangilinan, who also owns and manages his own farm in Cavite, lamented that the country's farming practices are "outdated."

"[We need] cluster farms for economies of scale," he said, referring to the grouping of interconnected producers, to transform the system from a subsistence crop production to a market-based production system.

"Until and unless we mobilize resources around farming communities and fishing communities and build their capacities, then we will not be able to get the full benefits of land reform," Pangilinan said.

He said he would focus on the establishment of cluster farms if elected to the Senate.

Pangilinan cited Taiwan and Thailand, which have clustered their smaller farms into larger 30 to 50 hectares of agricultural land.

In the Philippines, the average size of farmland is only around 9,000 square meters, he said.

Pangilinan also plans to boost support services — access to credit, access to market, organizing farmers into cooperatives, infrastructure and postharvest facilities like cold storage — for farmers and fisherfolk.

He said cold storage facilities would allow farmers to store their excess harvest for longer periods so that they wouldn't be forced to sell to abusive middlemen at a low price.

"If given the opportunity, precisely, then we will push for a six-year window of increasing government budgetary support to agriculture so that we can achieve food security and get our farmers out of poverty," Pangilinan said.

He earlier expressed his willingness to work with all sides of the political spectrum to end hunger and poverty, and achieve food security.