Yap vows to help city finish abattoir
Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap vowed to help the city government finish the construction of its AA abattoir in Barangay Tagbac, Jaro.
He assured that the department will provide additional financial help to the city provided the city will also have its counterpart.
The department through the National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS) already provided some P21 million for the slaughterhouse construction. The P21 million covers the construction of the P6 million Building A, P5.5 million holding pen for animals, P5.5 million waste water treatment facility and installation of various hog line equipment worth P4.5 million
As its counterpart, the city government sought an P11 million soft loan from the Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (DA-ACEF) to be used in additional civil works, cattle line equipment and concreting of access road. Representative Raul Gonzalez Jr. also committed to provide one electric generator worth P1.5 million for the new abattoir.
Yap, who was the guest speaker of the 2007 Agri Summit in Iloilo City, said the region should capitalize on the opportunity that Western Visayas is still internationally declared as foot and mouth disease (FMD)-free. The Asian nations which are also FMD free are Brunei and Singapore. The two countries are not into hog production and export business.
Western Visayas supplies 60 metric tons of pork monthly to Manila. From January to August, Western Visayas shipped 26,816 heads of hog in Manila and another 59,875 heads of hog in Cebu.
In the region, the DA has identified the investment opportunities in the hog industry such as utilization of farm wastes into biogas and organic fertilizer, fattener production and breeder production, meat processing/packaging, exportation of pork processed pork through "pork-in-a-box", fabrication of stalls, cages and other housing equipment, trucking and refrigerated van for hire, shipping and establishment of AAA abattoir.
The DA secretary said the department is not just only into production increase but is pushing for the post-harvest, packaging, branding, correct pricing and market access. The farmer and businessmen should also complement each other. "The time where only businessmen capitalize on the farmer is already over, it is already time for the farmers to earn profit," he said.