Assisting farmers in El Niño affected areas in the Philippines
El Niño, which swept the Philippines from 2015 to 2016, had a significant impact on agricultural production and food security. The project aimed to restore agriculture-based livelihoods of droughtaffected farmers in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and the Region XII, where a state of calamity was declared in four provinces. The project provided relevant agricultural inputs to the most affected and most vulnerable farm households and technical assistance through capacity building of the relevant institutions, extension workers and farmers in building resilience to shocks, effective drought management and more robust monitoring and forecasting systems.
What did the project do
The project provided farm inputs to help the immediate restoration of agricultural livelihoods of affected communities. An important part of the project was the organization of training workshops on improved drought management and crop production technologies to enhance households’ farming capabilities and resilience to shocks. The project also introduced an agricultural drought monitoring and forecasting system and organized capacity building activities to enhance government institutional preparedness to respond to disasters.Impact
The project helped restore the agricultural livelihood base of drought-affected farming households. Daisy Pama of Sultan Kudarat recalls the rice shortage in their town, “We had to fall in line to buy rice. Each family would only be allowed to purchase 5 kg per family per week. This was not enough. Our family of six normally consumes more than 7 kg of rice each week. We had no income for more than eight months so we were very happy after the harvest”. She added, “We would not have been able to recover from debt if FAO and the government did not come to help us. Now we have rice for the family and we were able to sell the rest of our harvest”. The rapid injection of agricultural inputs led to an increase in crop productivity, improved food and nutrition security, and enhanced resilience to shocks. Training activities on improved drought management and data, methods and tools for monitoring, early warning and forecasting of agricultural drought will help government agencies to mitigate the impact of droughts in the future.Activities
- Provision of relevant agricultural inputs (rice, corn and vegetable seeds, and fertilizers).
- Training of Trainers (ToT) for agricultural extension workers and local farmer trainers on improved drought management and crop production technologies to enhance households’ farming capabilities and resilience to shocks brought about by climatic perturbations.
- Enhanced institutional, extension service and farmer’s capabilities for effective drought management, resilience to shock, and ASIS (an agricultural drought monitoring and forecasting system under the FAO Global Information and Early Warning System (GIEWS).
Project symbol: TCP/PHI/3603
Project title: Emergency assistance for drought-affected farmers in ARMM and Region XII Philippines
Contact: FAO Office in the Philippines / FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific / Yongfan Piao (Lead Technical Officer)
Download PDF: http://www.fao.org/3/a-bs921e.pdf