Two top executives of Monsanto Company were once farmers in their home countries before they joined the prestigious American company. The farming experience, they say in an interview, helped them understand the intricacies of agriculture and food production.
Juan Farinati and Sandro Rissi grew up in farms in Argentina and Brazil, respectively. They joined Monsanto Company, a US agriculture conglomerate, and were assigned in Asia, where biotechnology is beginning to bloom, especially in the Philippines.
In an interview at Sulo Hotel in Quezon City, Farinati, the Singapore-based vice president of Monsanto for Asia-Pacific, and Sandro Rissi, country lead of Monsanto Philippines Inc., say farming is a noble profession that plays a crucial part in feeding the global population.
“I am from Argentina. I have been working for Monstanto for 15 years, but I have 39 years of experience in agriculture. We have a farm. My family is a family of farmers,” says Farinati.
Now, Farinati is in charge of Monsanto operations in Asia-Pacific. “I moved to Singapore a year and a half ago. I cover the whole region, basically from Pakistan to Korea, Japan, Australia and New Zealand,” he says.
Son of farmer
For his part, Rissi, who is based in Alabang, came from Brazil. “As a son of a farmer in Brazil, the first time I started farming by my own hands, I used to produce 3.5 metric tons of corn per hectare. Two decades later after that time, my family was able to deliver 10 metric tons per hectare,” says Rissi, adding that the increase in yield was led by the adoption of new technologies such as biotechnology.
“Brazil was a country that was importing corn less than eight years ago. Suddenly, we started increasing yield dramatically by technology adoption and agroeconomic practices improvement. Nowadays, we are exporting corn. We have excess corn in Brazil which allows us to supply other countries,” he says.
Christopher Samuel, Monsanto director for corporate engagement in Asia-Pacific, says the Philippines is an important market for Monsanto, which has been in the country for the last 45 years.
Samuel says in the Philippines, “75 percent of our team is from rural background. They know what is farming is about. More than that, almost 50 percent of total organization is women. Fifty percent of country leadership team is women.”
“We have 110 to 120 full-time employees in the Philippines. We also have 110 to 120 contractors and some seasonal employees. All in all, we are talking about 200 to 300 people working for us in seasonal or full-time basis,” says Samuel.
The Monsanto executives believe that the Philippines will be able to export corn in the coming years with the help of biotechnology, after attaining self-sufficiency status in 2013. “This is my dream. I wake up very early every day and I go to the job for this,” says Rissi.
Biotechnology is a biology-based technology which involves using organisms or parts to make or modify products or improve plants, animals or microorganisms. Several groups, however, have raised issues against biotech crops, especially over food safety, ethical and political concerns.
Biotech opposition
Chito Medina, national coordinator of Masipag group, claims that Filipino farmers who have been planting GM crops suffered negative income, health problems and poisoned environment. He says farmers who adopted GM corn suffered further indebtedness, health problems and a poisoned environment.
Monsanto disputes this, citing data showing that biotechnology helped the Philippines become self-sufficient in corn. Samuel says 30 percent of Filipino corn farmers are now choosing Monsanto’s six Dekalb hybrid corn seeds. He says the Philippines “is our biggest success in Asia” in terms of biotech corn. Through its brand Dekalb, the St. Louis, Missouri-based company has been at the forefront of corn seed technology.
It launched the first genetically-enhanced hybrid corn seed in the Philippines in 2003, with Bt or Bacillus thurengensis trait to control corn borer. In 2005, another trait was added, the roundup ready corn 2 technology which made corn plant herbicide tolerant. From 2010, more trains are expected to be launched.
Corn variants
A total of four variants of biotech maize from Monsanto have been approved for commercial planting, including Mon810 for insect resistance in 2002, NK603 for herbicide tolerance in 2005, Bt11 for insect resistance in 2005, and the stakced (double) gene product of Mon810xNK603 (2005), Mon89034 (2010) which is protected from feeding damage caused by Lepidopteran insects and Mon89034xNK603 (2011) with insect resistance and herbicide resistance in one plant.
Monsanto claims that since the launch of its biotech hybrids, it was able to improve the lives of about 500,000 corn farmers in the Philippines through higher crop yields, reduced farm input costs, increased farm profit, improved environment and less imports.
The Agriculture Department considers corn as the second most important crop in the Philippines, next to rice. About 14 million Filipinos prefer white corn as their main staple and yellow corn accounts for about 50 percent of livestock mixed feeds. Some 600,000 farm households depend on corn as a major source of livelihood, in addition to transport services, traders, processors and agricultural input suppliers who directly benefit from corn production, processing, marketing and distribution.
The Philippines used to import an average of 300,000 to 500,000 metric tons of corn annually.
Corn harvest
Corn production for calendar year 2014 reached 7.77 million MT, or 5.3 percent higher than the 2013 output of 7.38 million MT. Harvest area increased to 2.61 million hectares, or 1.86 percent than the previous year’s 2.56 million hectares. Yield improved from 2.88 MT per hectare to 2.98 MT per hectare.
This made the Philippines nearly sufficient in corn, with demand accounting for less than 8 million tons. Some 600,000 farm households depend on corn as a major source of livelihood.
It set a target of producing 10.82 million tons by 2017.
Agriculture assistant secretary and national rice and corn program coordinator Edilberto de Luna said the 2014 production consisted of 5.5 million tons of yellow corn and 2.3 million tons of white corn. De Luna said for 2015, DA was aiming to produce 8.4 million metric tons of corn.
Goal for PH
“The key thing that we want to achieve in the Philippines is how we can help farmers to be more productive with the technology available. Today, Filipino farmers are having a yield per hectare that is maybe 30 percent below the potential yield that they may have. In our trials in the Philippines, we are harvesting 7 to 8 tons per hectare for corn. Today, the average farmers is harvesting less than 5 tons,” says Farinati.
“There is a lot of room for practices and knowledge to help them to bridge that gap to be more productivity. The productivity in Brazil and Argentina, for example, from yield perspective, is in the range between 8 and 12 tons per hectare. If you think that way, there is a lot of room to continue growing productivity,” says Farinati.
Donation
To give back to the farming community and in honor of farmers, Monsanto has recently helped build houses for farmers displaced by typhoon Yolanda in 2013. “We had the chance to hand over some houses to farmers in Iloilo that were affected by typhoon Yolanda a year and a half ago. we decided as a company to support the farmers who were affected by the typhoon. That’s why we put in place a donation focusing on three main things: housing, relief and seeds,” says Farinati.
“We had a great experience to be with the farmers in their new houses, seeing how we can help customers and farmers and support them in their situation,” he says.
Rissi says Monsanto teamed up with Gawad Kalinga to build 50 new houses, assist 1,200 families and donate sees to 1,000 farmers. “In addition to providing our products, technology and services, we have our commitment with the community as well. If you do business in Visayas, how can we not afford to help farmers that have acquired our products and impacted by tremendous typhoon,” he says.
Monsanto employees
Monsanto employs 850 people across Asia-Pacific, half of whom are women, says Farinati. “We have facilities for production, processing seeds in the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, facilities for crop protection in Malaysia, Indonesia and we have research and development stations across Thailand, New Zealand, Australia, the Philippines,” he says.
Farinati says the Philippines is a very important market in the Asian region. “First of all, the Philippines is the first market where we launched biotech corn. It is a market where growth has demonstrated, actively adopting technology. It is a leading case of how we can together with the farmers and stakeholders in the sector. We can improve agriculture in the country and improve lives of farmers. It is a very important market,” he says.
Farinati says the rising global population will need more food. “We need to be more productive. The Philippines is in that path of increasing productivity. In Asia, we are seeing we need more corn moving forward. Today, Asia is a net corn importing region. Basically, Vietnam is importing, Indonesia is importing, Thailand is importing. The Philippines is the only country that through productivity has been able to catch up and be almost at par with demand and supply. The Philippines has big opportunity to continue growing in corn production and be able to supply the internal demand but also to be a part of the country exporting to other parts of Asia,” he says.
He says corn is one of the most important crops, as it also supports livestock, poultry and aquaculture sectors. “Clearly, the trend going forward is Asia will need more corn. As the diet of the population changes, we need more corn to produce poultry, pork. That is something very clear and the Philippines can play a big game,” says Farinati.
“Yellow corn plays a big role in the food value chain. From corn, more than 75 percent in feeds, that becomes chicken, that becomes pork. That is why there is a higher need for yellow corn,” says Rissi.
Population growth
He says the population of the Philippines is projected to grow by 7 percent to 8 percent every five years. “Today, we are 100 million plus people. We are going to be 140 million plus by 2025. This is the first factor. Economy is growing in the Philippines. When you start putting people in a better economic situation, the first thing that you do is they start eating better,” he says.
Rissi cites government data showing there are 1.5 million corn farmers in the Philippines. “If you look at other sources of data, they show that more than 400,000 farmers have benefitted from the introduction of biotechnology in the Philippines in the past decade and today, they are able to produce 49 percent or almost 50 percent more than they were producing 10 or 12 years ago, with lower cost of production, because there was a 60-percent reduction in pesticides they would apply on crops,” he says.
“This means they have a lower cost with higher yield which translates to more profitability at the end. There were studies that show farmers can earn $180 additional income up to $400, depending on the level of investment per hectare. If you put those numbers in perspective, we are talking about more than $400 million that has been added to the economy,” he says.
Less insecticides
Farinati says propagation of biotech corn has reduced the use of insecticides. “Sixty percent less on insecticides has huge impact, monumental impact. You are helping farmers to be more friendly with the environment,” he says.
Rissi says it has also reduced the use of water, “because if you apply insecticides you apply water.”
Rissi says by planting yellow corn, the Philippines has improved productivity. “If you look at the yield in the Philippines in the last 12 years, it has increased almost 50 percent, per hectare. So productivity has increased dramatically, which means today, a yellow corn farmer in the Philippines is producing 4.8 metric tons per hectare. If you look at the data 10 or 12 years ago, they were producing around 3.5 to 3.6 tons per hectare,” he says.
“What has really changed the game in the Philippines was the moment that we were able to introduce biotechnology here. We introduced BT technology by 2003, herbicide technology by 2005.
Bt corn
Actual planting of Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) corn started in December 2012. Bt corn was developed to fight Asian corn borer (Ostrinia furnacalis), a pest that reduces yellow corn yield by as much as 80 percent. Corn borers are the top pests of corn in the Philippines.
Bt corn carries a transplanted gene that produces delta-endotoxin protein, which can kill the corn borer. Once inside the alkaline gut of the corn borer, the Bt protein is activated and binds to specific receptors.
Rissi cites data from International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications showing that 800,000 hectares in the Philippines are now planted to Bt corn. “If you look at the area of Bt corn, we have around 1.3 million hectares, with 1 million hectares hybrid and 300,000 hectares open variety. So 800,000 hectares out of 1 million hectares of BT means 80 percent penetration, which is something similar to countries like Argentina, United States, Brazil and other places where you can plant biotechnology. So the acceptance is pretty high. Basically, this is basically driven by the needs,” he says.
Rissi says the Philippines achieved self sufficiency in corn in 2013. “So what is the target of the Philippines? We need to continue increasing yield and productivity to improve livelihood in the countryside, but there is a huge opportunity to improve the economics of the country to export corn to other Asian countries.”
Corn exporter
Samuel says based on statistics, some $1.3 billion or P60 billion were saved locally by not importing corn after 2010, when biotechnology adoption reached a peak.
Farinati says Asian countries are importing $1.2 billion worth of corn from the US and other countries annually. “So that is a big opportunity for the Philippines.”
Rissi says from the perspective of Asean integration, “I think the Philippines can work as a major player in harmonizing the standards in Asia. We have a highly scientific regulatory system, very progressive, to the extent we approved biotechnology in 2002. If you look at other countries, they are still developing the standards and protocols to enable farmers to play. Imagine the Philippines can play a big role in that one and take advantage of the opportunity to export corn to other countries.”
“In terms of corn consumption in Asia, from 322 million metric tons, it is expected to rise at least 20 per cent, touching 388 million metric tons by 2025. The gap between domestic production and consumption is likely to widen as time passes,” Farinati says.
“These facts motivate Monsanto innovate and partner to enable farmers to meet demands sustainably by enabling them with innovative products, agronomic practices and tools. Farmers can increase food and feed production to meet rising consumer needs amidst stagnant or diminishing natural resources and a changing climate, and to improve their lives, and tap export opportunities given geographic proximity to nations with large populations & growing food needs,” says Farinati.
Rissi says Monsanto is committed to sustaining Filipino farmers’ corn success with corn seeds with insect protection and weed management traits and so have invested in a 15,000 metric ton corn seed facility in Bulacan to provide farmers with the world’s most advanced product delivery stewardship system.
“We’ve been partnering with the Philippines and her farmers for over four decades, and over 75 per cent of the Philippines team is from rural and/or farming backgrounds. The company also focuses on being a great place to work, and women leaders currently constitute 50 percent of leaders in the country leadership team,” Rissi says.