President Marcos said the government will implement fiscal measures to cushion the impact of the El Niño phenomenon in the country which is expected to last until April 2024, threatening 65 provinces.

Marcos said this after he laid down some of his administration's measures to counter the effects of the looming dry spell on Wednesday, Dec. 14.

In an interview with reporters, the President ensured that the administration would carry out other strategies to ease the impact of the El Niño phenomenon on Filipinos.

“I think we will also have some other strategies concerning the fiscal measures that we can undertake para mabawasan naman ang load sa ating mga kababayan at kahit na kung anong mangyari (to lessen the load on our people no matter what happens),” he said.

Marcos said the government is analyzing world prices of food to see what would be the appropriate tariff level, among other fiscal measures the country could undertake.

A task force, to be established as early as next week, will also put together all the data from the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Energy (DOE) for an El Niño database so that the concerned agencies could have access to data for their modeling.

President Marcos said they are still working on the structure and general plan of the task force. 

Irrigation

Meanwhile, the Chief Executive said the biggest determinant of the agriculture sector's production levels was irrigation. Better water sources would increase the farmers' number of cropping seasons to three, which, in turn, would increase production immediately by 30 percent.

“So, that’s what we are hoping will be the effect of that," Marcos said.

"That is part of the general effort of the DA and of the government to increase our production. It just so happens that that is also what we need to do so that we can secure our rice supply, our food supply,” he added.

The President also mentioned a government plan for a massive information campaign about the impending dry spell.

“So, by early next year, we will begin to disseminate this information and let people know what it is that we are doing, what the forecast is going to be, how everyone can help, and what will be our strategies so that we can alleviate the effects of the drought," he said.