January 20, 2011

Philippine corn output seen to have hit goal

The Philippines' corn output is likely to have hit the government-set target for 2010, although the volume would still be less than what was produced in the previous year, a local agriculture official said.

"Corn production last year reached about 6.35 million tonnes, below production in 2009," said Dennis R. Araullo, national coordinator of the government's Rice and Corn Program.

The Agriculture department had targeted exactly that much corn for last year, an upgrade from the 6.22 million tonnes set in August.

But the estimate would still be 9.67% less than 2009's 7.03 million tonnes.

"Output was low because of the impact of El Nino that caused damage mostly in the first three quarters [of last year]," Mr Araullo noted.

Corn production in the nine months to September 2010 dropped 15.54% to 4.73 million tonnes from 5.60 million tonnes in the previous year as the drought ravaged cornfields.

Final agricultural output data for 2010 could be released this week, the department has said.

Mr Araullo said the department has yet to set the target for 2011. But Senen U. Reyes, senior management specialist at the University of Asia and the Pacific's Center for Food and Agribusiness, said that more corn can be produced this year. The private think tank expects corn production to increase by 14.5%-15.5% this year from 2010.

"Last year, production went down due to the dry spell...but for this year, we're expecting production to be higher due to better weather conditions," Mr Reyes said.