The Department of Agriculture (DA) is eager to get rid of its pro-importation stance, but admitted that there's still a need to import food because local production is still not enough. “We need to take care of our local commodity industry. Local production is the priority, and importation is a...
Millers and traders are blaming the poor quality of unhusked rice being produced by farmers to the current low prices of the staple food. (MANILA BULLETIN FILE PHOTO) This was validated by Agriculture Secretary William Dar, who said consumers now prefer quality rice. In a statement, the Department...
“Rice remains as the staple food of Filipinos. And there is no food that is used as widely as rice,” says Department of Trade and Industry Undersecretary Ruth B. Castelo on the Philippines being the sixth largest rice-consuming countries in the world. After over a year of enactment of the...
Farmers are appealing to Agriculture Secretary William Dar to stop claiming that palay prices are high at P19 per kilogram (/kg), because such dismissiveness is resulting in fear among the country’s main staple food producers that the government will not do anything to resolve their plea. Farm...
Apprehensive that a trade war is now brewing between the Philippines and Brazil over the import ban that the Department of Agriculture (DA) imposed on Brazilian poultry meat, the Philippine Association of Meat Processors Inc. (PAMPI) has strongly urged government to prevent this from happening. In...
The Philippine government is looking at financial rehabilitation of Northern Foods Corporation (NFC), a struggling government-owned tomato processing firm established during the administration of President Ferdinand Marcos, to make it...
From its original request of a P280-billion annual budget for next year, the Department of Agriculture (DA) may only end up with P129 billion for 2021, already including the portion of the stimulus package it has been requesting supposedly for this year. Agriculture Secretary William Dar...
Agriculture Secretary William Dar has assured the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), a specialized agency of the United Nations leading global efforts to defeat hunger in developing countries like the Philippines, that there's nothing to worry about the country despite the COVID-19 pandemic....
Banana, one of the biggest agricultural export commodities of the country, is now causing problems at the Department of Agriculture (DA), with Agriculture Secretary William Dar starting to seriously worry about something local exporters raised three months ago: “we’re losing our market...
About P400 million budget will be set aside for the Philippine government’s program to encourage Filipino households to plant their own food program, the Department of Agriculture (DA) said. In a statement, the DA said it is allotting P400 million under the “Bayanihan to Recover As One Act”...
An animal disease laboratory in Tarlac City funded by the United States government is now operational, and should help the Philippine government provide an accurate diagnosis of major animal diseases, prevent its spread, and ultimately protect the livestock and poultry industries in Central...
The series of import bans imposed by the Philippine government on pork and poultry products coming from different countries may result in costlier Christmas for meat loving Filipinos. MB file (Photo by Keith Bacongco) ...
