President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.’s decision to stay as agriculture secretary was welcomed by Go Negosyo and Private Sector Advisory Council (PSAC) Lead for Jobs Joey Concepcion, who believed that structural changes in the country’s agricultural sector could be the Chief Executive’s “legacy.” (From left) Go Negosyo founder Joey Concepcion and President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. (Photo from Joey Concepcion/Facebook) Concepcion hailed the President’s “smart decision” to remain as agriculture chief until the required structural reforms are instituted to toward enhanced efficieny and competitiveness. “Staying as the lead for agriculture is a smart decision from the President. He can quickly make reforms and ensure that all systems are in place to help the country’s farmers just like what his father did during his term,” he said in a statement on Sunday, June 18. “Having met the President several times to discuss Go Negosyo’s Kapatid Angat Lahat Agri Program (KALAP), I know that he cares for the farmers, and he is passionate to transform the industry. Given the right time, this will be his legacy,” he added. Marcos made the remarks in a recent event, and said he would appoint an agriculture expert once efficient systems have been put in place at the Department of Agriculture (DA) to ensure food security. “It is different if the President himself is at the helm of the Agriculture department. Also, he has good people implementing his vision for the country, like Agrarian Reform Secretary (Conrado) Estrella (III) and other government agencies,” Concepcion said. He promised that his organization and the private sector “are always here to offer our expertise to help the President attain his vision.” Concepcion also expressed support to the President’s program of encouraging farm clustering for his administration’s thrust of agricultural modernization. Farm clustering was one of the recommendation’s of Go Negosyo’s KALAP and think tank group Foundation for Economic Freedom (FEF) during their meeting with Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) officials. The Go Negosyo founder said farm clustering would boost productivity, ensure food security, and increase the income of farmers. He lamented that “for the period 2001-2021, the annual average contribution of agriculture to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is just 0.3 percent, while industry and the service sectors contributed 1.4 percent and 3.1 percent, respectively.” “This is not acceptable since the asset base of agriculture in terms on land use is huge compared to that of industry and service,” Concepcion said. “Philippine agriculture needs scale. We need clustering to achieve it. For this to become a reality, titling of land needs to be cleaned up,” he added. Farm clustering would attract big companies to invest in them since they are only interested in leasing farm lands rather than purchase them, he explained. It would also be easier for the government to provide loans and farm machinery to farmers since it would be dealing with groups rather than individual farmers. FEF representative Dr. Fermin Adriano explained during the meeting with DAR. Other countries that have implemented farm clustering are China, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Since then, these have enjoyed higher yields.