THE DEPARTMENT of Agriculture (DA) has launched a solar-powered cold storage facility in its training institute in Quezon City, which it said is the “first of its kind in the Philippines” and would benefit farmers in areas with unstable power supply.
DA Secretary William D. Dar, who attended the inauguration of the demo unit at the DA Agriculture Training Institute (ATI Building), said the facility can be easily installed in remote areas that do not have access to power.
Mr. Dar said in a statement that the department has partnered up with local firm Next Agri Corp. Philippines Inc. and Indian agri-tech cold-storage provider Ecozen Solutions Private Ltd. India for the project.
He said the project, which can be adopted anywhere in the country, will benefit off-grid rural areas that rely on agriculture, fisheries and related activities.
“Like other developing countries, the Philippine agriculture sector has been suffering from the high post-harvest losses. In high-value crops alone, the losses can easily reach 20% to 40%,” he said, noting farmers in remote islands are unable to preserve their produce as they do not have access to cold storage units.
This causes them to sell their crops at lower prices of below 50% of the actual production value to middlemen and loan sharks. — AY
