The Aura of Rice – a snapshot of the rice industry in the Philippines

We arrived into the Philippines to a hot steamy evening and a two hour drive to IRRI – the International Rice Research Institute located at Los Panyos . Established in 1960 by the Rockefeller Foundation and Henry Ford it is the place for rice research in the world and has the world rice gene bank which holds more than 100,000 native and modified rice varieties from all over the world.

IRRI has three main functions: Scientific and genomic reproduction; plant breeding and production and has 208ha of land upon which it grows 60-80ha of production rice (double cropped) with the remainder of land used for research, campus etc.

As 70 percent of the world relies on rice for food and or employment, the rice industry is certainly far more important that I ever thought and IRRI is leading a ‘Green Revolution’ to enable rice producers to escape poverty but still produce good quality, nutritious rice for consumption and at an affordable price. This is an enormous challenge – to economically and sustainably increase rice production using less water – the current amount of water required to grow one kilo of rice is 3000L.

One of the current research projects is to reduce the average time of rice cooking by four minutes. The consequences of achieving this is millions of energy savings per year, based on the number of people who eat rice three meals a day.

The rice industry in the Philippines is dominated by the Low Land Irrigated system of farming - an intensive method of rice production that is constantly under pressure for land competition by urban industrial development.

One of the greatest challenges for the Philippines is the increasing population and its status as the poorest nation with the biggest discrepancy between wealth in Asia. The agricultural wage is regulated at 234 piso per day - $2, this effects more than 30 percent of the population with the impact on pay parity between those who work at call centres, school teachers etc who can earn up to 20,000 piso per month.

Approximately 70 percent of Philippino’s are catholic and the church has a huge impact on the way this country is now and where it will be in the future. Filipino families tend to be large and there is some concern that the population may get out of control, however with the suggestion that the Philippine’s economic strategy is exporting labor, this potential issue may be all part of the grand plan.

Introducing Mandi

After graduating from Massey University with a B Agr Sci, Mandi spent three years working as farm management consultant in the dairy sector where she attained her Certificate in Adult Education before heading overseas.

After two years in the UK, Mandi spent three years in the North Coast of Australia working for a dairy company developing and implementing various extension programs programme and providing technical advice and support to dairy farmers through deregulation.

Upon returning back to NZ, Mandi spent some time with Dairy NZ setting up their Business Planning programme and completing a Masters in Rural Systems Management (Extension Evaluation) before leaving to manage a small agricultural consulting company.

Mandi now manages her own successful agri-business consultancy business, which she established in 2002. She has been involved in the design of farm systems extension programs in China; strategic planning in rural Russia and succession planning and business continuance in Australia in addition to providing on-farm management and strategic advice to her New Zealand clients.

Mandi is also involved in designing and implementing extension programs in both New Zealand and Australia with a particular focus on strategic planning and business continuance. She has a particular interest in learning preferences and is registered with VARK as a learning styles facilitator.

Mandi is an accomplished presenter at conferences and has been involved in both TV and radio as a presenter and producer of rural shows.

She is an equity partner in both a dairy farm and dry-stock farm in New Zealand.

Mandi lives with her partner Anton on a dairy farm near Hamilton and is actively involved with the Waikato-Hauraki Rural Support Trust, which she helped establish.

She is a 2005 Kellogg’s Rural Leadership Scholar and a 2009 Nuffield Scholar, in which she plans to study succession planning and business continuance in the rural sector.