The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) urges the government to create a strategy to lure Filipino migrant workers into the agricultural sector.
Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs)’ money can contribute in efforts to achieve food self-sufficiency and security, according to the OECD study titled “Interrelations between Public Policies, Migration and Development in the Philippines”, Business Mirror reports.
“The Philippines’ migration strategy should also integrate these dynamics so that migration can be a force for greater resilience in the agriculture sector. Agricultural policies need to be crafted to ensure they influence people’s migration decisions in a productive direction,” the study said.
The OECD study suggested three policies to encourage OFWs to consider investments in the agriculture sector: adequate labor market institutions, improving investment skills, and agricultural aid programs.
“Farming households in areas of high emigration should also be targeted with agricultural technical support [e.g. for the use of new resistant crops, fertilizer, irrigation techniques] to deal with the loss of labor, as well as a possible channel for investing remittances,” the OECD study suggests.
Jeremaiah Opiniano, executive director of the Institute for Migration Development and Issues, said the government should cement an awareness campaign to encourage OFWs to invest in agriculture.
Opiniano said agriculture-related businesses have been unpopular among OFWs because they think these are “risky” and “unprofitable”.
“Filipinos abroad and their families will not invest in farming and fishing because the returns are not as immediate as earning over a few hours work abroad,” Opiniano told Business Mirror.
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