Agri-Fishery Investment Forum comes up with clearer roadmap, co-investment framework

CEBU CITY – The 3-day Municipal Agri-Fishery Forum (MAFIF) on January 20-22 in Cebu wrapped up Thursday and came up with a clearer agricultural and fishery roadmap: a shift from short-term aid “ayuda” to long-term co-investment framework, pooling money from national, local, and private sources to improve production, post-harvest handling, and marketing of the agri-fishery sector.

 

“This three-day gathering in Cebu City brings together about 1,300 participants composed of national government, local government units (LGUs), farmers, fisherfolk, and private-sector investors from all over the country covering regions 1-13, including CAR, NIR and BARMN to align priorities and co-invest in agriculture and fisheries,” DA Undersecretary for Policy and Regulations, Atty Asis Perez said at the opening preliminaries of the forum.

 Perez said that the MAFIF is a platform for “co-investment planning,” where the Department of Agriculture (DA) matches funds from the national budget, LGUs, and private partners to boost productivity, infrastructure, and income in rural areas.

The bottom line, Perez added, is a co-investment partnership model, the new DA-REACH program, a pipeline of infrastructure and value-chain projects like roads, processing, cold chain, fisheries management and a mix of funding sources from the national budget, World Bank and EU loans, DBP/Land Bank credit, and private capital.

“The MAFIF is part a broader strategy under the Philippine Rural Development Program (PRDP) and the Masaganang Bagong Pilipinas agenda that aim to reduce import dependence of (currently at $19B of agri-food imports annually) and to increase farmer/fisherfolk income by 50 percent in target areas, including municipalities with high poverty incidence and geographic imbalances,” Perez bared.

Challenges and solutions in agriculture-fishery sector

In a side media interview with USEC Perez, he noted the need for targeted government investments in agriculture/fishery and the importance of private sector involvement and collaboration, especially in the budget allocation for agriculture and fisheries, emphasizing the need for increased investment for specific commodities and industries, on production and local value addition.

Perez said that it is important to invest in infrastructure, such as irrigation and farm-to-market roads and availability of funds for cooperatives and machinery investments in high-poverty municipalities, geographically isolated islands, and small island communities.

“Emphasis must be focused on fisheries, which now has a ₱15 billion budget, coffee, poultry, eggs, and other high-value crops. The need to align LGU priorities with national programs, identification of priority commodities such as rice, corn, swine, seaweed, mango, bamboo, abaca, and a pipeline of investment-ready projects such as farm-to-market roads, post-harvest facilities, and processing centers,” he added.

The Undersecretary shared that DA launched a new program at the forum called Deployment and Advancement of Responsive Extension on Agriculture for Community Holistic Development (DA-REACH) that aims to make municipalities the drivers of agri-fishery development and investment readiness.

Concrete projects in the pipeline

The MAFIF has identified some concrete projects in the pipeline including farm-to-market roads, post-harvest facilities, processing centers, and cold-chain logistics described as priority infrastructure in LGU Provincial Commodity Investment Plans (PCIPs) with the Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP) Scale-Up of $600M loan to fund these infrastructure and enterprise sub-projects.

The Fisheries and Coastal Resiliency (FishCoRe) Project with $200M to improve fishery management and reduce overfishing; Mindanao Inclusive Agriculture Development Project (MIADP) with $120M, targeting Indigenous Peoples in Mindanao; and the additional upcoming programs dubbed as Pagkilos-Locally Led Climate Action, Philippine Water Supply and Sanitation Project, Project for Learning Upgrade Support, all adopting the PRDP-style procedures.

Perez said the co-investment strategy is actually pooling of funding resource from the national government, DA’s 2026 budget request of P176.7B, including the P30B for the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (RCEF) and ₱33 B for farm-to-market roads.

Foreign-assisted financing from World Bank loans (PRDP Scale-Up $600M, FishCoRe $200M, MIADP $120M); European Union co-financing (about US$22 M) for PRDP in Bangsamoro and other vulnerable Mindanao areas.

Low-interest loans available from the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP), Land Bank of the Philippines, and the Agriculture Credit Policy Council; and LGU counterpart of 20 % of project costs typically provided by the local government units, as required by PRDP guidelines.

“in summary, this forum gathered local executives, national government officials, farmers, fisherfolks, private-sector investors, local banks and international funding institutions to establish a co-investment platform to boost productivity, infrastructure and income in the agriculture and fishery sector,” Perez concluded. (Photos: MBCNewman)