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By Ira Karen Apanay Senior
Reporter
Billions from the Internal
Revenue Allotment shares of local government units will be used for
the rice self-sufficiency program of the government, Agriculture
Secretary Arthur Yap said late Tuesday.
Yap told a Cabinet meeting that
President Gloria Arroyo had issued Executive Order 723 that
monetizes the unremitted allotment shares of the local governments
totaling P12.5 billion.
This amount, he said, represents
the total funds that have not been released to local officials since
the reenactments of the national budgets for 2001 and 2004.
Yap, who announced the issuance
of the executive order during a meeting with governors at the
Century Park Hotel in Manila, added that President Arroyo issued the
order on the understanding that the local government executives will
use the money for the rice self-sufficiency program.
The 37 governors who attended the
meeting called by the Agriculture department agreed to set aside a
portion of their internal revenue allotment allocations for
fertilizer procurement. The fertilizer is intended for the Quick
Turnaround program of the government and for the wet or main
planting season. The program targets increased production from the
agricultural, fisheries and other sectors deemed crucial in helping
resolve high food prices.
Yap explained that P6 billion of
the P12.5 billion will be used for fertilizer and seed support for
farmers of 40 critical provinces, or rice-producers.
He said the farmers will need the
P6 billion in two weeks, as the wet planting season comes in.
The governors have committed to
deploy their agricultural extension workers to the Agriculture
department for effective implementation of the government’s rice
self-sufficiency program. The programs aim to make the country
98-percent sufficient in rice by 2010.
During the meeting, the
Agriculture department and the League of Provinces of the
Philippines agreed on the fielding full time of the agricultural
extension workers in the department’s regional offices. They said
the move will complement the government’s efforts to step up
production of palay (unhusked rice) over the next five cropping
seasons.
Yap called the governors as the
country’s new “rice champions” whom the government expects to
focus on increasing rice production in the provinces.
Under the agreement, the
provincial governments will continue paying the salaries and other
compensations of the agricultural extension workers, including
year-end bonuses, salary adjustments and uniform and productivity
allowances.
The provincial governments will
also maintain the office and equipment of the extension workers and
remit the workers’ taxes and contributions to the Bureau of
Internal Revenue, Government Service Insurance System, Pag-IBIG and
Philippine Health Insurance Corp.
The agreement was signed by Yap
and Gov. Loreto Leo Ocampos of Misamis Occidental as national
president of the league of provinces.
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