Biotech Adds USD 200 Million to Annual Income of Corn Farmers

Iloilo City, Iloilo (PNA) — The Philippines is one of the successful models in the Asia Pacific for the application of biotechnology in crops, Chair of the Department of Agriculture’s Biotechnology Advisory Team, Saturnina C. Halos, said on Thursday.

Applying biotechnology on corn has improved the economic status of corn farmers, Halos said during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) High Level Policy Dialogue on Agricultural Biotechnology Meeting here.

She noted that corn farmers using biotechnology have increased their income by USD 200 million per year.

Biotech corn farmers have an 8-percent income advantage over hybrid corn farmers, while return on investments can go as much as 42 percent.

The improved income of biotech corn farmers was mainly due to a 19 percent increment in yields.

Halos stressed that utilizing biotechnology in the APEC region could thus alleviate poverty.

She further said that based on studies, 60.9 percent of Filipino biotech corn farmers spend their income on their children’s schooling, especially university-based education.

“It means, those who can already send their children to university are already out of poverty,” Halos said.

“If you apply that to the current number of farmers, (a) big number of (their) population are out from being resource-poor,” she added.

In 2014, more than 400,000 corn farmers used biotechnology in the Philippines, most of whom started out resource-poor.

On the other hand, 79 percent of local biotech corn farmers use their income for day-to-day expenses; 46 percent for home improvements; 23 percent for farm capital; 4 percent for buying a vehicle; and 0.5 percent for leisure.

The Philippines is one of seven APEC member economies that utilize agricultural biotechnology along with the United States, Canada, China, Chile, Australia, and Mexico.

About 800,000 hectares of land are allotted for biotechnology farming in the Philippines.

However, biotechnology in the country is currently applied to corn crops only.

The APEC region accounts for 90.15 million hectares of farmland or half of the total land area in the world used for biotech crops.

“There is a continuing growth for biotech crops,” said Halos.

She added that there is a sustained growth of 3 percent to 4 percent, or about 6.3 million hectares of farmland expansion, for agricultural biotechnology globally.

Aside from corn crops, biotechnology is applied to alfalfa, eggplant, canola, cotton, maize, papaya, poplar, potato, squash, soybean, sugar beet, sweet pepper, tomato, rose, carnation, apple, beans, and sugarcane. (PNA) FPV/PND/EDS