The Department of Agriculture (DA) continuously intensifies its campaign for the adoption of hybrid rice technology among local farmers.

In 2018 hybrid utilization is at 11.99% and posted an increase of 17.11% in 2019 based on the DA-Rice Program rice performance report.

To further convince farmers to adopt hybrid rice practices and technologies that would help improve farm productivity the DA – Caraga will be hosting the 11th National Rice Technology Forum (NRTF) in collaboration with Rice Productivity Advocacy Incorporated (Rice Board) in partnership with the Local Government Unit of Butuan.

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Planning for the forthcoming hosting of the 11th National Rice Technology Forum (NRTF) this October 2020,  Dr. Tomas Austral, Director of the Resource Generation and Management Services of Caraga State University (CSU), Ampayon, Butuan City presented the possible areas to showcase the hybrid rice varieties together with the farmers and seed company representative. CSU will lend around 20 hectares of its land to be planted with hybrid seeds for showcasing during the NRTF. This will complete the 100 hectares contiguous area requirement for demonstration in Brgy. Lemon, Ampayon, and Basag

For this year, a technology demonstration will be established in the three Barangays in Butuan City namely Lemon, Basag, and Ampayon with a total area of 100 hectares.

Around 40 participating farmer cooperators, the demo farms will be established in collaboration with the agri-companies namely SL Agritech Corporation, SeedWorks, Bioseed, Ramgo, Bayer, Pioneer, Syngenta, Advanta, and LongPing, alongside the DA-Philippine Rice Research Institute (DA-PhilRice) and Phil-Sino Center for Agricultural Technology (PhilSCAT).

DA-Caraga Regional Executive Director Abel James I. Monteagudo said that NRTF is part of the strategy of the Department to intensify the efforts in increasing the yield and productivity of farmers and ensuring food sufficiency, availability, accessibility, and affordability.

“Food is a vital commodity especially now as we are overcoming the threats of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is our mission to bring to the farmers the latest technology in rice production, this can be achieved by our collaboration and partnership with the rice industry stakeholders,” Director Monteagudo said.

In an interview with Renante D. Polistico, Farmer Cooperator from Brgy. Basag, Butuan City, he accepted the project for him to acquire the latest technologies on rice production.

“In my 14 years of rice farming this will be my first time to grow hybrid rice, I am excited to learn and looking forward to increasing my production for this wet cropping season. I am grateful to the DA for this opportunity,”Polistico said.

Currently, the farmer cooperators are now on its land preparation in their respective areas, preparing the rice field for planting. They will be provided with the seeds, input requirements, crop protection as well as technical assistance following the package of technology recommended for a particular hybrid rice variety by the agri-companies and rice institutions.

Different planting methods will also be demonstrated and rice mechanization will be integrated.

Through the technology demonstrations, farmers will have the opportunity to choose which among the best practices and technologies introduced are applicable to their farm conditions. Results are expected to be seen this coming October during the 11th National Technology Forum. (Rhea Abao/DA13RAFIS)