An 8 weeks worth of work
So what have I actually been doing most days in the Philippines…
I have been working with Dr. Cecelia Acuin on the Heirloom Rice Project. The objective of the heirloom rice project is to raise the productivity of traditional rice varieties through empowering communities in unfavorable rice based ecosystem-specifically upland regions. The slogan for the initiative is “capturing value, preserving heritage.” The reasoning behind this is that traditional rice varieties tend to be more nutritious than commercial rice and by promoting these traditional varieties, we are preserving a critical part of the population’s heritage.
The part of the project I am involved with is doing an analysis of the farmers through surveys.The objective of the surveys are twofold. First, we would like to get the farmers’ perspectives of the problems they face in the farm, including those related to earthworms and other pests. Second, we would like to determine the diets and sources of food for the farmers’ households, as well as their food security status. Surveys were done in person for the heirloom rice farmers in the Mountain Province, Kalinga, Ifugao and Benguet.
The surveys had three distinctive parts. The first was establishing the basic background information and sociodemographic information of the farmers and their households. We included information that would be important factors in the pest/earthworm and diet and food security analysis. For example we requested to know the family size of the farmers to understand how many people the food produced was intended to sustain. We also asked about the size of the farm and average yield of the farmers.
The second part of the survey was intended to get information regarding current practices in managing pest/earthworm problems. The surveyors started by asking the farmers about the top 5 constraints (both biotic and abiotic) they face in the field. The question was intentionally broad to avoid skewing the data by suggesting the earthworms were a problem in the first place. The surveys conclude that the biggest problem listed by most farmers was bugs, rats, birds, earthworms, and lack of water. We can characterize earthworms as a present problem considering more than a third of farmers put it in their top 5 challenges. Then if the farmers noted that earthworms were in their top five challenges the surveyors continued with questions about earthworms specifically. They were asked basics questions about the characteristics of the earthworm such as shape and size. Then they were asked about the damages the earthworms caused and how the farmers manage it. Finally they were asked about their awareness of Integrated Pest Management.
The final part of the survey was to do a diet and food security analysis. The questions were based on a questionnaire that was developed by the Food and Agriculture organization (FAO). First, we asked questions about the prevalence of hunger and food security. The questions were asked in increasing severity in order to be able to distinguish between which households demonstrate mild to severe hunger and undernutrition. The second part of the nutrition survey intended to get a profile about the diets of the population. Foods were split into several food groups. Farmers identified which foods they ate most frequently within each group, how often they ate the foods, and where those foods came from. This data can be used to assess what foods the farmers lack access to.
For example our data shows that approximately 95% of fish that farmers consume is bought rather than self-produced. This suggests the need for initiatives like a rice-fish system that allow the farmer to farm both rice and fish within one plot to maximize water and land usage.
After analysis of the data there are many interesting and surprising conclusions that we can draw. The average age of farmers for both men and women was over 50 . It is important, especially for work such as farming which is labor intensive, to have a working population that remains young. Having an aging working population presents a problem in the sustainability of the heirloom rice farms. This reflects a broader societal trend of young people being less attracted to farming as a livelihood. The survey’s also revealed that there was a lot of variance among farm size between the farmers. The average farm size was more than twice the median. The large difference between the mean and the median are due to the presence of several farms that are much larger than the other farms. For example there is one farmer with a 10,000 sq meter sized farm. The large variation between farms sizes is a compelling reason to support the importance of farmers’ cooperatives in the region. It is important for smaller farmers to work together in order to remain competitive with bigger farmers. For example, a farmers’ cooperative can help small farmers form economies of scale and establish a market presence to sell rice on a more consistent schedule.
The surveys were incredibly important to gain a farmers perspective and also to reveal information that is critical to future policies. The data from three other provinces is still being analyzed and hopefully even more interesting conclusions will come.
