ISABELA – Farmers from this province had to harvest their crops overtime on Sunday before these could be destroyed by typhoon Rolly.
As early as 3 a.m., Sunday, groups of farmers made sure that they were able to harvest their palay and corn to make sure that they could still benefit from these crops.
Before “Rolly” could make landfall, Agriculture Secretary William Dar had urged farmers to harvest their mature crops immediately and, in other cases, delay planting until weather and field conditions were favorable for planting.
“Halos mag iisang buwan na po kasi na pasulpot sulpot nalang ang araw, nadapa mga palay namin dahil sa ulan ng ulan, pinalala pa ng bagyo ,hindi naman po kaya ng reaper pag sobrang dumapa na ang palay,” a president of a farmers’ cooperative in Isabela told The Manila Bulletin .
Another president of a cooperative group Jacinta Apoy said there were farmer-members who were crying when she was able to contact them over the phone on Sunday.
She said they were crying out of frustration that no one wanted to go to the fields to harvest their crops so they had to do the harvesting themselves.
“Ang problema pa wala na iyong mga gumagapas, kaunti nalang naggagapas kaya madami pa po hindi naani.”Apoy said.
Jacinta also told The Manila Bulletin that, with the successive weather disturbances, farmers are complaining that they could no longer pay their loans.
"May mga members na nga po na nagpahayag na hindi na sila makakabayad sa loan po nila kaya po malaking problema ang idinulot ng sobrang ulat at bagyo Jacinta added.
She said some were able to harvest their palay, but still, it would be hard for them to dry these under the current weather conditions.
“May mga nakaani naman po hindi naman makabilad, umitim din yung ani nila ayaw na bilhin reject na. May iba naibenta naman sa presyong 10-11 pesos ng presyo.”
As such, Apoy called on concerned agencies to help the farmers in Isabela.
“Please kung ano ang maitulong natin sa mga farmers please po ASAP tumulong naman po tayo. Kung magbibigay po kayo ng binhi, abono."she cried.
Apoy noted that Landbank could take the initiative in looking into how the farmers could pay back their loans with the government bank.
“Sana naman ang Landbank ay makapagbigay ng considerations,” she said.