Under the GMA Rice Program, the DA will also develop rice specialists and provide more training courses on seed growing and hybrid rice farming, he added.
Last year, Malabanan said some 225,371 hectares were planted to hybrid rice during the dry season and over 93,000 hectares during the wet season.
This year, he said the DA is targeting a total of 400,000 hectares planted to hybrid rice, and expects this figure to swell to 600,000 hectares by 2010. Farmlands using hybrid seeds have posted a yield-average of 6.2 MT per hectare, while areas using certified seeds produce just about 4.5 MT per hectare.
The DA is also putting up or repairing irrigation facilities nationwide servicing 523,000 hectares, and is building 30,000 kilometers of farm-to-market roads along with other postharvest facilities over the next three years.
Over the 2007-2010 span, Malabanan said the DA aims to build national and community irrigation systems covering some 187,500 hectares and to repair existing facilities servicing 290,200 hectares.
It also plans to put up small-scale irrigation projects that would cover some 45,300 hectares of land.
The DA will also build new irrigation facilities that will service a total of 523,000 hectares of farmlands nationwide. (PIA Dispatch)
Food
