Dr. Gil C. Saguiguit, Jr., SEARCA Director, delivers the opening remarks at the start of the Seminar-Workshop on Facing the Challenges: Agenda for Action for the Philippine Agriculture Sector held on 26 July 2010 at PCARRD.

A new “Green Book” that discusses policy issues and directions for Philippine Agriculture will soon be available. Titled Agenda for Action for the Philippine Agriculture Sector, the book is a result of a research collaboration among the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA), University of the Philippines Los Baños College of Economics and Management (UPLB-CEM), and the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCARRD). The research analyzed and provided recommendations on pressing policy issues besetting the Philippine agriculture sector today.

The book is the second ‘Green Book’ edition. The first Green Book, titled Agenda for Action for the Philippine Rural Sector, was published in 1987 by UPLB CEM. It presented policy statements and programs for reforms in agriculture during the crucial time of transition under the Corazon Aquino administration then.

The new book is intended to set policy direction and to promote wide and intelligent discussion of agriculture in the mass media and agriculture stakeholders, private sectors and government, said Dr. Corazon T. Aragon, Chair of UPLB-CEM’s Research and Extension Committee. It tackles policy issues on productivity, rural poverty and malnutrition, rural institutions, sustainable agricultural development, climate change, and alternative energy. It also discusses directions for trade, improving supply chain of grains, high-value fruits and vegetables, agribusiness enterprises, and enterprise development.

The new book’s contents were presented by the authors in a seminar-workshop held at PCARRD on 26 July 2010. Titled Facing the Challenges: Agenda for Action for the Philippine Agriculture Sector, the seminar-workshop was attended by policy makers, development practitioners and stakeholders of the agriculture sector. It aimed to solicit experts' opinions and views for inclusion in the book, to be presented to a full-blown symposium slated in September 2010.

In his opening remarks, Dr. Gil C. Saguiguit, Jr., SEARCA Director, said that the book was “timely and strategic, and important to Philippine agriculture in particular, and to our country’s rural development in general.” He sees the publication as especially helpful to the new Aquino administration, particularly in the Department of Agriculture. It also helps address SEARCA’s aim of addressing agricultural concerns especially via policy recommendations.

The workshop was part of UPLB-CEM’s celebration of its 32nd Foundation Day. Dr. Luis Rey I Velasco, UPLB Chancellor, thanked SEARCA and PCARRD for supporting UPLB-CEM, which has been helping address issues in agriculture for more than three decades now.