THE Department of Agriculture in the Cordillera Administrative Region (DA-CAR) , through its Agricultural Training Institute-National Training Center (ATI-NTC), is looking into clustering farmers and fishers in the region in an attempt to achieve better profits.
ATI-NTC Cordillera Director Charlie Sagudan said that the plan for the DA-CAR is to have smaller produce farmers and fishers group together under the Farm and Fisheries Clustering and Consolidation (F2C2) program to better drive profits for the clusters.
The pilot project in the Cordillera involves three farmers’ organizations in Barangay Balili in Mankayan, Benguet.
Under the clustering, farmers and fishers are to group together and command better control of produce prices as a group instead of being subjected to individual prices and the accompanying instability associated with small-scale selling.
The clustering also aims to prevent produce dumping, which lowers prices overall for dumped crops.
“By organizing them into clusters, we will be able to demand competition and raise the mark-up,” Sagudan said.
He also said that under the F2C2, the delivery of supplies is timed to allow farmers and fishers to come up with a certain quantity desired by their clients.
“This will also allow the farmers to give the market time to breathe and not dump all the produce at the same time,” Sagudan said.
He said that based on experience, an oversupply leads to a drop in the prices of the commodities, causing losses or leading to a breakeven situation among the farmers.
