Philippine Business Magazine: Volume 9 No. 3 - Cover
Fruits of Farming

"I am a third-generation Mindanaoan, from a family that has struggled over the years to use agriculture as a vehicle for both business growth and social responsibility"

Science as a Tool
Lorenzo also has good appreciation for the science aspect of agribusiness. “Science is playing a greater role in agriculture today. Biotechnology, biodegradable plastics, and integrated pest management are just some of the fields we need to explore further. In particular, biotechnology has been showing evidence that, if harnessed properly, it can improve productivity, increase efficiency, raise food quality, lower chemical and energy inputs (and thus lower costs), and lead to novel and more effective medical treatment. Biotechnology can therefore increase the competitiveness of our agricultural sector tremendously. We have to be open to it and search for the proper balance that will benefit the farmer as well as secure public health and safety.” Related to this, Lorenzo laments that the global economy is taking leaps forward given new and emerging digital and biological technologies, while the Philippines continues to lag behind in many areas. He suggests, therefore, that “Along with building a critical mass of infrastructure, harnessing technology properly can make us more globally competitive.”

Lorenzo emphasizes: “There’s a lot of work to be done and not one person or one sector can do it alone. We need teamwork between government and private sector, between industry leaders and farmers.”

For his part, Bacani cites the two things that government needs to give agriculture: more investments in water and easier access to credit. “A lot of crops are dependent on rainfall and farmers generally plant during the rainy season. Problem is when they plant at the same time, they harvest at the same time and this creates a situation where prices become pretty bad. This is why you need to have irrigation systems or water that you can manage. This will enable you to manipulate the supply. On the need for financing, a very small percentage of credit goes to agriculture and fisheries when in fact the sector represents one-fourth of the economy. Credit is the sector’s decades-old problem. This is because financial institutions have always considered agriculture as a very risky business because of the vagaries of weather and other things. Agricultural land is not even acceptable as collateral. As a result, there is a very low percentage of farmers who have access to formal credit. If they do not have credit, they cannot even buy the right inputs even if they have the right know-how and skills. In the agribusinesses that we manage, we help in facilitating the credit and sometimes even bridging it.”

Lorenzo sums up what can nourish the sector: “We all have to focus and move with urgency towards strengthening a commodity- and market-based drive to be the best. Being one of the best agricultural economies means raising the bar and benchmarking against the global best throughout the supply chain; in today’s dynamic environment, it also means being flexible in responding to what the customers demand. The benefits should of course translate into better incomes for the farmers, as well as fair price, food quality and safety, and reliability for the consumers.”