October 7, 2004

Philippines Spending 20% More On Dairy Imports
 

The Philippines is spending more for dairy imports which grew to $237.48 million as of the first half of the year. This figure is up by 20 percent, as the peso continues to depreciate against the dollar despite slower dairy volume import.

National Dairy Authority (NDA) records showed that dairy import volume from January to June this year grew by a minimal 2.2 percent from 167.13 million kilos to 171.150 million kilos in the same period last year.

Rene Martin de Guzman, NDA planning manager, said the dairy volume is almost flat even as local dairy milk cooperatives assisted by NDA and the Philippine Carabao Center have been increasing their production. But the import bill is adversely affected by the peso's value.

"Our import is flat. The value is high because of peso depreciation. Our production increased because of the animals brought in last year," he said in an interview.

The country's major dairy import sources were New Zealand, taking up 39.78 percent of the volume, Australia, 20 percent; Thailand, 16.18 percent; and the United States, seven percent.

De Guzman said NDA alone has already hit its 2004 target fresh milk production of 20,000 liters per day from 16,000 liters per day last year. From January to June this year, NDA-assisted dairy cooperatives produced a total of 5.86 million kilos of milk, taking up 62.56 percent of the country's milk production.

This milk production still takes up a minuscule three percent of the 177 million kilos of milk supply in the country. Cow's milk production takes up 61 percent of total milk output, carabao's milk, 38 percent; and goat's milk, one percent.

Despite the big importation, the country exported R6.732 million worth of milk products. But this export only represents re-exported products or milk processed locally but whose raw material is also imported.

On the whole, the country's livestock population as of the first semester grew by 2.9 percent from 9.091 million heads to 9.354 million heads in the same period last year. This is broken down into 2.583 million cattle, 3.310 million carabao, and 3.46 million goat.

The total dairy herd is 23,344 heads consisting of 8,938 heads of cattle, 13,107 heads of carabao, and 1,299 heads of goat. There are 10,250 farm families producing dairy products and 240 cooperatives.