Philippine farmers face tough times after storms (News Feature)

Villasis, Philippines - Fred Pajarito was bent low over flooded rice paddies in the northern Philippine town of Villasis, hoping to salvage rice stalks inundated by floods brought by back-to-back storms. The 70-year-old farmer looked up briefly to check his two grandsons who were helping him gather what was left of their crop. 'We'll just get what we can for our food,' Pajarito said, slashing the wet stalks with his scythe. 'There's barely any left for us to sell.' Pajarito and his grandsons were supposed to harvest their crop this week. They expected to harvest about 50 sacks of the national staple, which they planned to sell at the local market. But Typhoon Parma struck at the start of the month, bringing heavy rains and gale-force winds that triggered deadly floods and landslides. A week before, Tropical Storm Ketsana dumped a month's worth of rain on Manila and outlying areas, causing rivers and dams to swell. 'It's going to be tough to recover from these two storms,' Pajarito said, discarding a bunch of rice stalks. 'Those are useless already. The husks are empty.' Pajarito's half-hectare lot was among thousands of farms washed out by the floods in Pangasinan province, 165 kilometres north of Manila, destroying rice, vegetables and other crops. Livestock was also lost. Other rice- and vegetable-producing provinces in the northern Philippines were also affected by the deluge, leaving thousands of farmers in the country in a dire situation. 'We don't know where we will get money to buy new seedlings for the next planting season,' said Fausto Ramos, a village councillor whose 11-hectare farm was also devastated by the floods. Ramos said he plans to sell one of his three tractors to be able to buy seedlings. 'We're back to zero,' he said, shaking his head. The father of three used to be able to harvest more than 1,700 sacks of rice from his farm, but he said he would be lucky to get 300 sacks this season because of the flood damage. The National Disaster Coordinating Council said Parma and Ketsana destroyed crops and livestock worth an estimated 10.75 billion pesos (233 million dollars). They battered provinces that were the traditional sources of rice and vegetables in the Philippines, raising concerns over the country's food supply. On Monday, the government placed an order for imports of 250,000 tons of rice two months ahead of schedule. The order is for deliveries from January to April. Agriculture Undersecretary Bernie Fondevilla said the Philippines, the world's biggest rice buyer, might need to import around 2 million tons of the staple grain for 2010. The volume is nearly 13 per cent higher than this year's imports of 1.78 million tons, most of which was supplied by Vietnam through a government deal. A presidential spokeswoman said the government was also looking into the possibility of importing vegetables because farmland needed to be rehabilitated before planting could resume. 'Based on the assessment of damage from the recent typhoon, we will study if there's a need to import vegetables,' deputy presidential spokeswoman Lorelei Fajardo said. Prices of vegetables have already as much as tripled in Manila as supplies coming from the northern Philippines were delayed because of the storms. A vegetable farmer who identified himself only as Jose spent the past three days trying to find a way from Mountain Province to Baguio City, where he planned to sell his bell peppers, cucumbers and cabbage. Dealers then bring the produce to Manila. Weary of his futile attempt, Jose started selling the vegetables at a loss on a roadside in Naguilan town in La Union province. 'Please just buy the whole sack,' the forlorn-looking farmer pleaded with one customer looking at the bell peppers. 'I'll give you a bigger discount if you get more than one sack.' While the vegetables were already starting to rot, Jose said he hoped to sell enough to raise money to buy new seeds. 'I also need money to buy fuel to get back home,' he added. An economic adviser of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has called for a 1-billion-dollar rehabilitation plan for typhoon-hit areas. The programme would be financed mostly by foreign grants and concessional loans. The House of Representatives has also vowed to fast-track a 10-billion-peso supplemental budget for relief and rehabilitation efforts. Aside from the hefty costs to agriculture, Parma and Ketsana also damaged nearly 5 billion pesos of infrastructure, including bridges and roads. More than 650 people were killed in the two storms.