The Department of Agriculture (DA) will investigate the possible involvement of its own officials in several non-existent farm-to-market road (FMR) projects discovered in Mindanao.

Agriculture Assistant Secretary Arnel de Mesa said there is a strong possibility that some officials are involved in the reported “ghost” projects, given the agency’s role in monitoring the project.

Under the current policy in FMRs, the DA identifies and validates sites for such projects, which are then transferred to the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), which oversees the entire bidding and construction process.

De Mesa said a project can be declared complete only after both the DA and the DPWH have given their approval. However, he said this did not happen in some of the reported anomalous FMRs.

“The DA should have seen that because it’s the DA’s fund,” De Mesa, also the DA’s spokesperson, said in an interview.

“To reiterate, we’re not involved in implementation from bidding to commissioning to project implementation. The DA is not involved, but we should monitor,” he added.

The DA has so far confirmed the existence of seven non-existent road projects in the province of Davao Occidental, with an estimated loss of ₱105 million.

Last week, Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel personally inspected two of these projects, with one nowhere to be found and the other still showing freshly poured cement, suggesting it was hastily done to show some progress.

Tiu Laurel has since summoned three contractors in charge of the FMRs in the province, alongside the district engineers under the DPWH assigned to that area.

The DA has been ramping up efforts to hold those involved in the bogus FMRs accountable, especially after accepting the Senate’s challenge to take over their construction from the DPWH.

De Mesa said this change in policy could be made by a small amendment to next year’s General Appropriations Act (GAA) or the national budget, specifically in the special provisions.

“If you don’t have a special provision and the fund is with you, it means that you have the responsibility and obligation to implement it. So you’ll just remove the special provision,” he added.

He said this potential turnover has not yet been confirmed, as it will still need concurrence from both chambers of Congress in the bicameral conference committee.

If this plan pushes through, De Mesa said the agency is confident that it can competently build FMRs through the Bureau of Agricultural and Fisheries Engineering (BAFE). He noted that BAFE was not yet instituted when the FMRs were transferred to the DPWH over a decade ago.

One of the reforms that the agency would pursue is to amend the cost standards in FMRs, which is currently uniform regardless of topography.

According to the DA, one kilometer of FMR costs ₱15 million.

De Mesa explained that the cost should be lower, or potentially higher, depending on the land condition.

Moreover, the DA will also propose to include bridges under its FMR project, specifically those spanning 20 to 60 meters, which are meant to connect FMRs.

“It’s not a priority of DPWH because these are the small bridges. So the road is being built, but the full potential is not being used because you don’t have a bridge,” said De Mesa.

He said the government has a backlog of 1,482 farm bridges.

Under the DA’s proposed budget for next year, the FMR program has been earmarked ₱16 billion to build 1,067 km of roads.

But, this is expected to go up by as much as ₱8 billion following the budget reallocation of ₱39.4 billion into the DA.

The additional budget comes from the ₱255.5-billion flood control project, which was redirected to the priority programs of other government agencies amid the flood control mess.

According to the DA, the country needs around 131,000 kilometers of FMRs to efficiently link agricultural production areas to markets. So far, it has only built around 70,000 kilometers.