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The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and the Department of Agriculture signed Friday the minutes of the meeting for a project that aims to improve the food value chain in the country.

JICA Chief Representative Takema Sakamoto and DA Senior Undersecretary Domingo Panganiban signed the minutes of the meeting to amend the records of discussion for the market-driven enhancement of vegetable chain in the Philippines (MV2C).

The ceremony marks the implementation of the project that will be piloted in the provinces of Benguet and Quezon.

The best practices learned in the two provinces will later be applied to other vegetable-producing countries.

The project seeks to enhance distribution systems, the quality of food supply, stabilize prices, and improve the quality of life for farmers and consumers.

According to Panganiban, the M2VC project will create inclusive business models that will help increase the income of Filipino vegetable farmers, in line with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s orders to rebuild value chains to achieve food security and sufficiency.

"With the increasing food prices and inefficiencies in the food supply chain due high cost of logistics and food distribution, we need to find a more efficient way of delivering the goods and markets, thereby making it more affordable to the consuming public,” Panganiban said in his opening speech.

“We are hoping that through this M2VC project, we will be able to capacitate vegetable farmers in meeting market demands through the different interventions that will be provided," he added.

Marcos also serves as the agriculture secretary.

In an interview with The Daily Manila Shimbun, Panganiban said the M2VC project is in the after-production stage and that will be a “year-long” activity.

“We are entering the so-called after-production activity which is selling, storage, and marketing…We should be able to help the farmers achieve long-lasting productivity that will be good for them in the long and short run,” Panganiban said.

Sakamoto said they would like to support the diversifying of agricultural projects and after-harvest activities in the production of vegetables.

Sakamoto said: “We envision our project to provide solutions to the pressing issues in the food value chain in the country, and eventually contribute to the improvement of the quality of life of our farmers.”

He said the market-oriented approach is also important in addressing problems related to income generation job creation, and disparity mitigation among others.

In a separate interview with the Daily Manila Shimbun, Sakamato said the project would solve the mismatch between the supply and demand of vegetables as well as logistics issues.

“Until now, the vegetables that consumers wanted and the vegetables that farmers produced did not match. This mismatch problem will be resolved. Vegetable losses in logistics are also significant. When transported from Benguet to NCR, many are rotten or damaged and must be discarded,” Sakamato said.

“We will make it possible to ship vegetables that are needed by the market in the season when they are needed. In addition, we will solve logistics losses through temperature control and other measures. This will lead to stable prices and can increase farmers' income, and reducing losses may lead to lower end prices,” he added.

Sakamoto said they would like to support the diversifying of agricultural projects and after-harvest activities in the production of vegetables.

"After the harvest, we would like to support the food value-chain development including the proper management of the storage and the distillation systems for communicating with farmers and market," Sakamoto said.

Sakamato said they will deploy Japanese farming experts who will stay here to teach farmers and analyze marketing needs.

JICA is the executing agency of Japanese Official Development Assistance (ODA), which handles technical cooperation, ODA loans and investment, and grant aid, as well as cooperation volunteers and disaster relief programs. Jaspearl Tan/DMS