Farm, fishery output shrink as El Niño hits

The value of the country’s agriculture and fisheries output in the second quarter contracted by 3.3 percent as crops and livestock production dropped due to the ill effects of the El Nifio weather phenomenon.

- JASPER EMMANUEL ARCALAS

The sector ’s production in the April to June period amounted to P413.91 billion, about P14 billion lower than the P427.948 billion recorded in the same period last year, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

“This was due to the annual decreases in the values of crops and livestock production during the period,” the PSA said yesterday.

The value of crops output, which accounted for half of the entire agriculture and fisheries production, fell by 8.6 percent to P220.04 billion.

The PSA recorded contractions across the value of 20 crops during the reference period, with sugarcane posting the steepest decline at 42.3 percent.

The production of palay, the primary crop of the country, fell by 9.5 percent year-on-year while corn output declined by 20.3 percent during the reference period.

The other crops that saw contraction in value of production were onion (-37.4 percent), tomato (-15.6 percent), mung beans (-14 percent), abaca (-12.4 percent), rubber (-7.5 percent), cassava (-7.2 percent), eggplant (-7 percent), sweet potato (-5.8 percent) and bitter gourd (-5.1 percent).