WB to raise rural incomes halfway to target

THE World Bank (WB) said its assistance to farmers and fisherfolk in the Philippines has increased their income by 15% over four years, or halfway to the 30% target of income growth by 2021.
In an implementation and status report, the bank said that the Philippine Rural Development Project has also increased the income of beneficiaries involved in enterprise development by 27% at end of 2018, since the project began in 2014.
“Progress towards meeting the PDO (project development objective) continuous to be satisfactory. Assessments of project impacts indicate increases in real household income, increase in value of marketed output, reduction in input and output hauling costs, increases in farmed area, increase in production volume, reduction in travel time from farm to market, increase in traffic density, and increase in school attendance,” the World Bank said.
“Additional outcomes being realized via the country-wide institutionalization and acceptance of provincial commodity investment plans as a technically-based planning platform for convergence between programs of the DA (Department of Agriculture), LGUs (local government units), and other national government agencies.”
The project aims to increase rural incomes and enhance farm and fishery productivity in the targeted areas by supporting smallholders and fisherfolk to increase their marketable surpluses, and their access to markets.
The project has four components, which includes $19.27 million in support for local and national-level planning, $669.13 million in infrastructure development, $136.94 million in enterprise development, and $57.49 million in project implementation support.
Since 2014, the project yielded a 21.5% increase in the value of the annual marketed output, about half the 41% target set for the end of 2021.
The World Bank said that farmers reached with agricultural assets or services stood at 773,968, exceeding the 600,000 target. — Elijah Joseph C. Tubayan