Gov. Alfredo Marañon Jr. yesterday announced that the Department of Agriculture in Western Visayas will have a 39 percent increase in its budget in 2013 and Negros Occidental is one of the provinces that will benefit from it.

Marañon, who turned over P18,864,000 worth of farm equipment and post harvest facilities to 176 farmer organizations and associations at the Negros Occidental Mutlti-Purpose Activity Center in Bacolod City yesterday morning, said that the increase in budget means more help will arrive from the national government.

He also noted that when President Benigno Aquino III assumed office in 2010, DA’s national budget increased by 30 percent for calendar years 2011 and 2012, and it will go up by 20 percent next year.

The governor also thanked President Aquino and Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala for the projects and their support to agriculture, adding that another P18 million in farm machineries will be given to the province through DA and the Philippine Center for Postharvest Development and Mechanization.

Marañon also told the farmer-beneficiaries to make use of the equipment and handle them with care as these will help them improve their livelihoods and farm production.

“We are already late in terms of farm mechanization as our Asian neighbors like Taiwan, Japan, South Korea and Thailand started it 25 years ago, but it is better late than never. This is just the beginning of our farm mechanization,” he said.

The governor also lauded the farmers and called them the true heroes because they provide food for the people.

Cesar Balajadia PhilMECH cluster head for Visayas said that the mechanization program is a six-year project that started in 2011 and that they will continue to provide farm equipment that will help the country achieve food sufficiency through appropriate technologies.

The province, PhilMECH, and DA turned over 10 threshers, 30 hand tractors, 6 rice transplanters, a combined harvester, 5,740 laminated sacks, and 272 collapsible dryers to the 176 farmers’ organizations and associations from districts 1 to 6.

Also present at the turnover were Board Members Nehemias de la Cruz and Salvador Escalante, La Carlota City Mayor Juliet Ferrer, San Enrique Mayor Mario Magno, Moises Padilla Vice Mayor Abner Jardinico, and Manuel Escalante, executive assistant to the governor. *LTG

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