Growing up in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., the closest I came to agriculture were the tomato plants my father cultivated in our backyard next to my mother’s flower beds. Or the family visits to local farmers’ markets on summer weekends to buy fresh corn and other vegetables. As a university student, a course on “International Agriculture” broadened my perspective. Marrying into a family of West Texas cotton farmers introduced me to the hardships faced by farmers. Uncertain weather, uncertain yields, uncertain prices – each season taught me more about why earning a living farming the land is hard work that often yields little or no profit.
Like in the United States, agriculture plays an important role in the Philippines. The crops are very different but the problems of weather, pests and market uncertainty are just the same. Last week, I got to join the United States Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack, as he visited the Philippines. He toured the International Rice Research Institute outside of Manila where we heard of phenomenal research taking place to produce better seeds and crops that can withstand typhoons as well as provide greater nutrition. We tried our hand at the hot, back-breaking work of rice planting while standing barefoot in a muddy rice paddy. We saw how rice is painstakingly harvested by hand.
Later we moved out of the fields to see a Philippine Flour Mill that produces high quality flour made from US wheat for use in local bakeries. We joined agricultural business leaders from the United States in meeting with their Philippine counterparts to see how they could further enhance the already robust trade in agricultural goods and products. Mindful of the devastating damage caused by recent typhoons to agriculture and food stocks in the Philippines, Secretary Vilsack concluded his visit with a donation of 8.5 million dollars worth of rice and dried milk to help feed those displaced by flooding.
Ambassador Kristie A. Kenney is a career United States diplomat who has served since 2006 as the first female U.S. Ambassador to the Philippines.
Comments (3)
Helen E. Cornejo
Location: Quezon City, Philippines
November 6, 2009 at 01:04 EST
Permalink
I worked for 22 years in a pharmaceutical company, and as such, I was always pressured with sales target and deadlines. While still with my company, my last assignment was in Mindanao as Team Leader. Eighty percent of my time was spent in traveling around the island. This is how i saw the real beauty and potential of the “Land of Promise”. I am a native of Luzon, but falling in love with Mindanao, i bought a small house in Valencia,
Bukidnon where i hope to spend my retirement someday.
Before the flood last Sept. 26, 2009, I started making preparations to go back to Mindanao so I can venture into agri-business. I have had enough of the corporate world, and this time, i would like to go into agriculture. I am happy to know that research to produce better variety of rice is ongoing. Rice planting in Bukidnon is the business i wanted to enter into. Also, i was able to attend the Vermiculture, (organic fertilizer composting using earthworm) in Central Mindanao University and I found it very, very interesting. I can compost organic fertilizer that i can use for my rice field, thus, producing organic rice. I know, this might not be easy, but i am willing to learn the pros and cons in this kind of agriculture. It gives me the feeling of happiness and contentment to embark in agri-business, really.
You are correct Ambassador Kenney. “Farming the land is hard work that often yields little or no profit” but after retiring from my work last 2007, my heart says, “Venture into agri-business. It’s nice working with the land.”
Jesus Berenguer Lintag
Location: L.P. City
November 16, 2009 at 08:29 EST
Permalink
Dear Madame Ambassador:
The bone of contention in agricultural production lies in the policy mistake called the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law(CARL). To illustrate: in terms of self-development the CARL makes it easy for “carpetbaggers” to grab lands from rightful workers and their managing landowners. It encourages envy and greed for lands that were worked and sweated for.
It is anti-democracy as it “gives away” lands that were earned and accumulated by sweat and hard work. It prevents entrepreneurs to expand what they own and discourages investments from foreign and domestic sources. It is the source of misplaced and unjust covetousness not dissimilar to the land collectivization program of the then Soviet Union which wiped out peasant landowners known as kulaks.
Finally…. it is a source of legal confrontation where cases of taking without due process and or just compensation have clogged the courts and where graft and corruption have revealed taking by way of issuing Certificates of Land Transfer without ascertaining the true beneficiaries of the land.
In this age of mechanization and scientific farming the policy thinks “small” where ignorant would be owners cannot even manage what they have and sell this just to earn money.
This is just the partial the truth that shall set us free!
Pat Candalla
November 20, 2009 at 13:08 EST
Permalink
Congratulations, Ambassador Kristie, with the successful visit of Sec. Clinton to the Philippines. You did a fantastic job with the preparations and the executions of the
plans. As an American of Filipino descent, I am proud of your accomplishments in the Philippines. You are the best! I am saddened by the news that you will be leaving the post soon, but I hope your next posting will be better and closer to home. More power and good health!
Pat Candalla