AVANT GARDENER

Everybody talks about the need for more young people to consider the agriculture industry as a viable career. Danilo Fausto, president of the Philippine Chamber of Agriculture and Food, Inc (PCAFI), a conglomeration of the different sectors in Philippine agriculture, stated in the organization’s general meeting during AgriLink 2023 that “of the 47.35 million employed Filipinos in January 2023, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said 22.2 percent were in agriculture (87.3 percent in agriculture and forestry and 12.7 percent in fishing and aquaculture). With a family of five members, we have around 52.56 million Filipinos dependent on agriculture targeted for slaughter by these so-called economists.”

This was said in reference to the Philippine government’s continued dependence on importing basic agricultural products instead of bolstering the local agriculture industry. This isn’t the policy of a specific administration but an ongoing thing.

“The principles of supply and demand work well in a perfect economic condition. But with the environment facing the international markets, climate change and geo-political conditions, we should be prudent enough and think that our basic staple should not be relegated to outsiders. We should endeavor hard to have food autonomy specially for our staple commodities. And we cannot achieve this if we keep on giving incentives and encouragement on imports,” Fausto continued.

This lack of support isn’t just felt by folks in the agriculture industry, but those outside it too, whether they know it or not. The aging of our agriculture practitioners and the refusal of young people to enter the industry can only be detrimental for the future of the Philippines. But Filipinos don’t tend to think long-term.

“There is a need to provide support to our young would-be agripreneurs, like providing them with financial incentives, grants, and subsidies as they enter the agribusiness sector. This can help alleviate the initial financial barriers. Guide them to institutions that offer financial support, grants, or low-interest loans to young individuals who want to start their own agricultural ventures,” he added.

Support is important, as there are actually young people who are in or who want to enter the agriculture industry. I was able to talk to two of them when I visited the Bukidnon Integrated Coffee Center (BICC) to hear about Nescafe’s Kape’t Bisig sa Pagbangon project, which aims to increase awareness and enthusiasm for agriculture among the youth while continuing the brand’s commitment to help its partner farmers become agripreneurs.

Part of the project involves the coffee brand partnering with four Mindanao state institutions to identify 400 beneficiary students, prioritizing children of farmers in agriculture-related courses to be awarded ₱25,000 each to fund their academic requirements.

Queenie Subasco, daughter of a coffee farmer and a beneficiary studying agriculture at Sultan Kudarat State University, said in Tagalog: “I was convinced to (study) agriculture because the number of agriculture students is decreasing and I wanted to show them that [working in] agriculture has a lot of benefits and opportunities waiting.”

When asked why young people don’t want to go into agriculture nowadays, she said: “Students nowadays choose nursing, education, criminology. They don’t see the value of agriculture. They don’t see how much the country needs agriculture [practitioners]” adding: “The youth think working in agriculture is dirty. That it has no goal and that studying agriculture is lowly.”

An Cristie Tangcalagan, an administrative aide in the Department of Agriculture Misamis Oriental and an agriculture graduate, added in Taglish: “…in my perspective, we have related farming with poverty, sadly. I am the granddaughter of farmers. Both on my father's and mother’s side, both my grandparents are farmers. They [were] really raised in poverty… I relate to farmers and where I was growing up… the farming lands [were] converted into subdivisions, which is very frustrating… [But] We are also fighting [back]. Maybe in your view, we are giving up on agriculture but no, we are still here, a new breed of farmers and agriculturists, and we're really fighting for it. It’s just so sad that [the negatives] are what’s being highlighted, but we are really trying our best.”

It’s heartening to hear that there are young people who still want to enter the agriculture industry, but this does not remove the fact that their numbers are dwindling. If we want a strong agriculture industry, all practitioners, not just the youth, should be encouraged through increased wages and earnings, supportive legislation and infrastructure, and a favorable business climate.

Providing cheap food for Filipinos while ensuring agriculture practitioners earn an adequate income (they should earn enough to at least be considered middle class) is a hard balance, but it must be achieved if we are to keep people in the agriculture industry and secure our country’s food security, sovereignty, and justice.

As Fausto said: “Providing cheap food for the consumers and fighting inflation through imports is a short-term solution. Producing our own food requirements, although a much longer process, will be more sustainable for our people.”