This is my Point of view, meaning all the words and information listed in this article was based on my observations and heard ideas read what was happening in the farmers and why small farmers can never be rich.
In the Philippines do you know that farmers who produce rice were buying some milled rice for the table?. Do you know that some farmers can't even afford to buy sacks of rice? That’s the hurtful image of the sun dwellers and rain flue catcher in my country. It's very poor when it comes to the issue of the farmers who are the backbone of the people's food.
Not entirely in the Philippines, this was the real side. The Philippines is now growing as the food sustainable agriculture spot of the world. A wide variety of crops had been developed from a seed centre, hybrid and disease tolerant varieties of plants, a drought and pest resistant kind of plants.
The idea of “Small farmers in the Philippines can never be rich” was my inspiration to change that concept. The real side of it was farmers now becomes rich, but people ignored the idea.
Why? On the other side, the modern farmer wasn’t just a farmer, nowadays we are traders, businessmen and some are even scientists and breeders. They were just a simple farmer yet they travelled in the portal of new digestion of the technology.
On other hand so why do Filipino farmers need to buy rice?
This was because of scarcity and loans. After the typhoon arrived most of the farmers' lost their capitals in the flood or heavy rain nor wind. They need to start up again and that is embracing the loan and some could even shake hands with the loan shark.
If you think it’s the government that was the culprit? I don’t agree with that. The solution was within the technology yet people are still hesitant to try. Yeah, I see the problem of farmers that was scared to try the new. That’s was the great problem of modernization of the government, some won't agree to conduct such changes in their farming.
When it comes to rice, we all know that Filipinos cannot live without bowl rice, the meal was incomplete when rice wasn’t cooked well, that’s how the demand for the good is considered vital in the Filipino diet. In my life, I was always convinced that even we don’t have the money but we had a bowl of rice we will survive, that’s the idea I get from my elders and my parents.
Are you aware of the rice tariffication law? Why were some people against it and some wasn’t in the idea of that? The Rice tariffication law was made to lessen the tax of the imported rice because of the demand, so the traded quantity of the tons of well-milled rice that was come mostly from China, Thailand and Indonesia will be increased and the priced of the commodity will gradually decrease. Sound interesting and comfortable for many city dwellers, but absurd to the middle sun fighters.
Farmers was fleed to erase the bill at the moment it was ready to be signed by the government. But the battle was made them cried for the bill was now an official law.
It gives them a huge loss for people are much more interested in the exported goods, for the price impact was that high, and much cheaper to buy at the imported goods.
The Rice tariff that was implied was ideal for the farmers also, the tax from the goods from outside could make it a subsidiary to the local farmers. But then things happened in some manner I don’t actually understand much more until now. I need to read more about the data for the latest.
Could you imagine why they are will sell their raw rice and just buy some regular ones from the market?
Imagine the farmer will plant a good label of variety, the soft and aromatic quality yet the food they take was just the regular, its hard texture and the awful smell. For the much more need money, and the rice they just sell wasn’t in the good amount, for the competition of the market was against imported rice is battle the investment of the farmers.
The real side had not yet been untold. The government is giving a subsidy to the farmers yet some it wasn’t enough, which was acceptable for the subsidy was given to the landlord, not the lant tenant.
Landlord is the owner of the rice field while tenent are the workers whom they get percentage of the total harvest.
The main issue and I idea I got is that, farmers now a day are planting good and quality rice yet they consumed different for they are too much more in the balancing the profit over their needs. So This might be an eye-opener to us, that don’t brag about the rice we eat, don’t think that your father or grands was rich after the harvest season and demand for the new phone or any extravagant. You might not see it for you were not in their position, but being a farmer is stressful. Thanks for reading…
Uhuuuy. Ang sakit nga nitong isipin, Kuya. 'Yung sila ang nagtatanim para may ma-consume tayo tapos in the end, sila din 'yung walang makain minsan. Nagpo-produce sila ng crops for us to consume pero sila din pala is kailangan din na makipag-sabayan sa market para bumili at para lang may makain. Ang sakit kaya sa heart nito. 💔 Tapos ayun nga, dumating si RTL. At first 'di ko pa 'to magets kasi kakasimula ko lang sa college by that time, but then naintindihan ko din habang tumatagal. Maganda naman aim n'ya pero ewan ba at 'di ganun ang nangyari. So proud 'dun sa mga farmers natin na naglalakas loob na mag-take ng risk, lalo na 'dun sa mga nakaka-invent ng mga bagay para mas mapadali ang pagpa-farming nila. Mas dumadami pa sila, nowadays.