Courtesy: DA
PRESIDENT Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. welcomed the ceremonial signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on Cooperative Partnership for Agricultural Machinery between the Department of Agriculture (DA) and the Korea Agricultural Machinery Industry Cooperative (KAMICO) on Tuesday, hoping it would lead to much improved agricultural productivity and food security in the country.
Speaking during the signing ceremony in Malacañang, the President highlighted the importance of mechanization to agricultural production, noting it has been the thrust of his government to boost food production particularly rice, the country’s major staple.
“We all recognized very clearly the importance of mechanization for our country because we are trying to move the production, we are trying to make sure that at least the local supply for rice is sufficient and, of course, hopefully, also the other crops,” Marcos said.
“The key to all of this is mechanization and all of the things that we’re trying to do. We have some programs to mechanize. We have the RCEF program, in which is the collections from the tariffs on rice importations are then applied also to mechanize,” he added.
Establishing local machinery production is the first step towards agricultural development, Marcos said, expecting it to result in better yield and lower production cost to make Filipino farmers more competitive.
Among the salient features of the MOU include the establishment in the country of a local agricultural machinery manufacturing cluster including assembly production line, research and development of agricultural machinery technology, workforce training on agricultural machinery technology, and a grant of Official Development Assistance (ODA) to further explore potential projects.
A KAMICO official said that an initial investment of US$30 million would be made in phase 1 of the project and triple that amount in the second phase.
