RP’s first line of defense against climate change

By Sosimo Ma. Pablico

THE ESTABLISHMENT of a Research Institute through an executive order of President Gloria Arroyo as the country’s first line of defense against drought and climate change is now being proposed by two noted scientists from the Ilocos provinces – Dr. William D. Dar, director general of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and Dr. Santiago R. Obien, retired executive director of the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice).

They said the Philippines has more than three million hectares of drylands cultivated by about five million households, most of whom are very poor especially in Northern Luzon, Central Visayas  and Southern Mindanao. Recurrent droughts and environmental degradation due to climate change aggravate the untold suffering of these poor communities.

In 2007 alone, the entire Ilocos region experienced extreme drought that caused serious damage to corn and rice crops in La Union, Ilocos Sur and Pangasinan. There was practically no rain in the whole region during the months of June, July and early August.

Dr. Dar and Dr. Obien, who come from Ilocos Sur and Ilocos Norte, respectively, said such a situation strongly justifies the establishment of a Philippine Dryland Research Institute (PhilDRI) that will generate and adapt appropriate innovations to improve the livelihoods of poor dryland communities and empower them to cope with climate change. Moreover, the growing global demand for biofuels provides tremendous opportunities for poor farmers to profitably grow and process dryland crops that yield bioethanol, biodiesel and oil without compromising food security.

They added that while research institutes devoted to rice, coconut, sugarcane, cotton, carabao, root crops and other strategic commodities already exist in the Philippines, nothing is devoted to dryland agriculture and bioenergy, including corn which is second to rice in importance as food, feed, fuel and forage. Moreover, the absence of a dryland research institute dealing with drought puts the whole country in a reactive situation with no institutional mechanism for drought mitigation – making poor dryland communities quite vulnerable to the vagaries of nature induced by climate change.

The Philippine Dryland Research Institute (PhilDRI) is envisioned as the country’s first line of defense against drought and climate change. Likewise, through cutting edge science and social empowerment, PhilDRI will substantially contribute to poverty alleviation by mobilizing science and technology to improve the livelihoods of poor communities in the drylands.

The proposed programs for PhilDRI cover dryland farm innovation, biofuel crops, participatory watershed management, strategic social science and policy research, as well as communication, capacity building and social mobilization.

Among other things PhilDRI will develop cutting edge innovations and develop new business and funding models on profitable farming for major dryland crops that could be grown in marginal drought-prone areas. 

These crops include corn, sorghum (sweet and grain), pearl millet, groundnut, chickpea, pigeonpea, soybean, cowpea, mungbean and forage crops.  It will also generate or adapt   innovations on the production, processing and utilization of bioenergy crops without compromising food security.  These crops include sweet sorghum, cassava, sweet potato, jatropha, pongamia, castor beans and other crops/trees.

PhilDRI is proposed to be based at MMSU (Mariano Marcos State University) in Batac, Ilocos Norte.  It will eventually integrate the human and physical resources of CODA (Cotton Development Authority), which is based at MMSU.

Dr. Dar and Dr. Obien have identified the Government of India (GOI) as the first potential donor to PhilDRI, as the GOI has emerged as one of Asia’s economic superpowers committed to help other developing countries through South-South collaboration. Likewise, India is now a world leader in dryland agricultural research and biofuel production and processing.  Thus, the Philippine government will request technical assistance and a grant of US$ 20.0 million from the GOI to start operations of PhilDRI with counterpart funding from DA.

(Readers may reach columnist at spablico@yahoo.com. For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/harvest-time/ For reactions to this column, click “Send MESSAGES, OPINIONS, COMMENTS” on default page.)

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