SAN JOSE, Antique – About 17,044 rice farmers in Antique province are expected to benefit from the fertilizer discount vouchers (FDV) of the Department of Agriculture (DA) as farm input support.
DA Agricultural Program Coordinating Office (APCO) officer-in-charge Sonie Guanco said the municipal agriculture officers (MAOs) have been instructed to validate the master list of the recipient- farmers.
“The FDV will be a big help for the farmers because they could already avail of the discount for their fertilizer input,” Guanco said.
Each farmer registered with the Registry System for the Basic Sectors in Agriculture (RSBSA) will receive a voucher worth P6,200 per hectare of planted rice area for August and September, which is under the second cropping period, he added.
Sibalom MAO Albert Estoya, in a separate interview, said adequate fertilizer is very critical in their production since their municipality is considered to be the rice granary of the province with its total rice area covering 6,500 hectares.
“Farmers in our municipality really find great relief considering that they would need at least six to seven bags of fertilizers to be applied per hectare of land,” Estoya said, adding that farmers are now assured of having at least one-half of the farm input that they need as a bag of fertilizer costs P2,400.
