LEARNING from the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (RCEF)-Mechanization Program from 2019 to 2025, the Philippine Center for Postharvest Development and Mechanization (PHilMech) is sustaining the “best practices” it has developed and put into place into the RCEF 2.0-Mechanization Program.
PHilMech Executive Director Dionisio Alvindia said that the major “best practices” the agency developed that made the first RCEF-Mechanization Program successful are: Conducting the whole bidding, acquisition, and awarding process for machineries livestream over Facebook; strategically organizing the farmers cooperatives and associations (FCAs); training them and local government units (LGUs)-beneficiaries in the modernized farm operations; and sourcing the equipment to be distributed under the program from various suppliers who in turn should carry quality products and can ensure adequate aftersales.
“PHilMech has been conducting the whole bidding, acquisition, and awarding process livestream over Facebook, including the opening of bids envelopes. Through this process, we are able to curb corruption, and generate savings as overpricing is impossible,” he said.
Alvindia said that this process will be sustained under RCEF 2.0 to ensure the judicious utilization of the P9 billion allocated annually for the mechanization component in the next six years starting 2025.
He said that what is equally important in making both the two phases of the RCEF-Mechanization Program successful are the pre-distribution and post-distribution activities.
“And after the farm machineries are turned over, we continue to monitor the utilization and maintenance of these by the FCAs and LGUs who are the beneficiaries. Any underutilized or unutilized equipment is taken back and given to a more deserving FCA or LGU. More importantly, the machine suppliers are obliged to deliver quality aftersales as needed by the beneficiaries,” Alvindia added.
He said that having a number of qualified suppliers also challenges the suppliers themselves to keep delivering the best also in terms of aftersales, as Filipino farmers do not want lengthy downtimes when their machineries are deployed.
Another best practice that PHilMech developed under the first phase and sustains application under RCEF 2.0 is carefully studying and determining the specific machinery each geographical location needs. This resulted in the allocation of approximately 28 percent of the P36 billion of the RCEF mechanization component getting allocated for land preparation technologies, which in turn required the distribution of four-wheel tractors.
The remaining 62 percent was allocated for harvesting and other post-harvest technologies, including combine harvesters, and palay (unmilled rice) dryers and mills.
“Overall, PHilMech carefully and strategically put in place best practices to make the first phase of the RCEF-Mechanization Program successful, and sustain those best practices in RCEF 2.0,” Alvindia said.
The result are FCAs and LGUs who benefitted from the program continuously deploying or utilizing their machineries, and more FCAs and LGUs applying for the program. THE MANILA TIMES
