Iloilo rice yield up 3.8MT per hectare
Rice yield of Iloilo province has increased to 3.8 metric tons per hectare this year, said Provincial Agriculturist Ildefonso Toledo.
Toledo said the increase in rice yield can be attributed to the farmers’ use of certified seeds, including the 3,000 farmers who graduated from the farmers’ field school.
“About 80 percent of the farmers in Iloilo use certified seeds for their first cropping,” Toledo noted.
Farmers in Iloilo were able to plant their first cropping this year only in July because of the prolonged dry spell.
In the first cropping, some 97,000 farmers planted rice, 80 percent of them using certified seeds.
The area planted in the province is about 127,000 hectares, both rain-fed and irrigated.
Ildefonso, however, cannot yet provide the total production for this year with the data coming from the municipal agriculture offices still being consolidated.
He said though that 90 percent of the rice farms planted only for one cropping this year because of the late rainy season brought about by El Niño.
Those who are planting for second crop from November to December will have their production registered next year, Toledo said.*PNA
