Two tales of political will

PRESIDENT Marcos, in deciding to take the Agriculture portfolio and in ordering the resumption of face-to-face classes in August, have made two important calls. He displayed thereby his capacity to make important decisions that may not necessarily be popular.

Assuming the Cabinet post as secretary of the Department of Agriculture (DA) in a concurrent capacity is no doubt indicative of the seriousness of the problem that the country is facing in terms of food security. The President manifests in no uncertain terms his desire to curb the looming food crisis and to pursue rice sufficiency for the country — the way it was back in the days of Masagana 99 of his late father. In a way, we can say he was swayed for sentimental reasons. He would attempt to catapult the Philippines back to a rice-exporting country status through his own Masagana 150, his key agricultural focus. By then, he could have emancipated the country from being the fourth largest importer of rice in the world at $1.21 billion in 2020 to becoming a massive rice producer and exporter and attain his "aspiration" of P20 per kilo of the staple.