ANTIQUE – Rice farmers in Antique are being urged to prioritize high-value crops (HVC) such as onions and garlic to prevent their shortages and normalize prices.
During Monday’s provincial council session, Board Member Rony Molina introduced a resolution amid “widely disturbing news of an overwhelming price increase in the market for two of the HVC, namely onion, and garlic.”
He encouraged the Department of Agriculture (DA) and the Office of the Provincial Agriculturist to teach farmers the necessary planting technology.
“Most farmers are into planting rice rather than HVC in Antique because they do not know the technology,” Molina said.
Ronald Ardeño, a 34-year-old farmer from Barangay Sinaja, Belison, said he earns more from growing onions than rice.
“I was able to earn around P20,000 from the one-fourth hectare that I planted with onions,” he said in an interview. This is in contrast to his P12,000 earnings during rice harvest.
Ardeño received onion seedlings from the DA in October last year. (PNA)/PN
