Gov. Yap assures enough food supply

The province of Bohol has enough food supply in this time of crisis.
This was the statement issued by Gov. Art C. Yap when he met with local media last Wednesday at the New Capitol Building.
The assurance was given by Gov. Yap amidst apprehension on food shortage in the province as most provinces in the country are affected by COVID-19, citing also that most of these abundant provinces have to suffice supplies considering uncertainty as to when the crisis will end.
Gov. Yap said the Provincial Government of Bohol (PGBh) through the Office of the Provincial Agriculturist (OPA) is mobilizing now to convince Boholano farmers at irrigated areas to plant hybrid rice and those at rain-fed rice lands must have to plant inbred rice.
The governor revealed that the provincial government has the Advance Rice Technology (ART) 160 program which encouraged the use of hybrid rice and ART 120 in the use of inbred rice among Boholano farmers which aim to increase rice production.
He explained that planting hybrid rice at irrigated areas is advantageous because it yields 8 to 10 metric tons per hectare (ha.) compared to inbred which can only produce 6 metric tons per hectare.
Hybrid rice is not suitable in rain-fed areas because it needs enough supply of water wherein such rice lands are only good for inbred.
The governor encouraged the Boholanos to plant these varieties and refrain the use of the farmer’s rice seeds which only yield 3 to 4 metric tons per hectare.
It may be recalled that Gov. Yap in a press briefing last April said that the governors of Cebu, Saranggani and Bohol were discussing on how to buy from rice-producing provinces while waiting for the submission of price quotations from Isabela, Nueva Ecija, Pangasinan and Cagayan.
The governor issued the statement after he was briefed by the National Food Authority (NFA) regarding the food security stock of NFA rice in Bohol.
He said that in reality if we just consume based on our regular consumption then we will actually not run out of supply. The problem is everybody is rushing to buy more rice which resulted to unduly depleting our rice stocks and with this we are pushing the price of rice to go up.
The governor said that this is the reason why he cautioned the Municipal Local Government Units (MLGUs) and barangays of indiscriminate buying of rice and instead advised them to buy rice regularly because it is now the harvest period.
Assistant Provincial Agriculturist Larry M. Pamugas reported the consolidated food situation in Bohol based on the data source from DA-Provincial Agricultural Technology Coordinating Office, NFA and Rice Tech, the number of days to consume the rice stocks as of April 15, 2020, are 69 days/ 2.3 months or will last up to June 23, 2020.
Pamugas added that based on the rice inventory as of April 15, 2020, NFA has 68,000 bags at 50 kilograms (kgs.), Marcela Farms (80,000), Bohol Quality (22,000) and other small traders (15,000) that would last for about 18 days while the expected rice yield of the remaining harvestable rice farm are 513,138.8 bags that will be consumed by the Boholanos for about 51.73 days.
He said the 1.3million Boholanos would consume 9,920 sacks of rice per day.
With regards to the stocks of corn in the province, last March during the harvesting period Bohol had produced 2,723.57 sacks of corn grits that would only last for 7.96 days as the daily consumption of Boholanos of corn is 342 sacks, he said.
Pamugas said that as of now based on the daily monitoring Bohol has enough supply of vegetables and fish.
The Boholano fishermen have sold their fish catch at the different markets and malls in Bohol because they could not sell their products to other provinces due to the implementation of the community quarantine.(Atoy Cosap)