THE Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) said that 88 percent of the P7.5 billion fund for the Coconut Farmers and Industry Development Plan (CFIDP) had been released to agencies and that a significant boost in program implementation was expected for this year.

The PCA reported to the Philippine Council for Agriculture and Fisheries (PCAF) that P6.6 billion of the total fund was released as of May 2024. The PCA and PCAF-National Sectoral Committee on Coconut held a discussion last May 28.

Kreisha Marielle Roque, actinbg manager of the PCA Program Management Office, said that despite implementation delays, certain agencies, including the PCA and the Agricultural Training Institute, had already begun carrying out their assigned roles as part of the program.

Moreover, the PCAF approved a policy resolution recommending that the Department of Agriculture, through the PCA, broaden the program's scope of beneficiaries. The PCAF said that this would ensure that every coconut farmer benefited from the CFIDP.

Additionally, all implementing agencies must ensure that regular coconut farm workers and farmers are included as beneficiaries.

The PCA also said that it was actively working on enhancing the National Coconut Farmers Registry System (NCFRS) to improve services provided to farmers and other stakeholders.

To expand the registration of coconut farmers, the PCA is focusing on empowering field staff at the barangay level by providing them with the necessary skills for encoding and validating farmer information.

In line with this, the PCAF committee asked the PCA to consider issuing identification to all registered coconut farmers for easier authentication of eligibility when accessing grants and benefits under the CFIDP.

Included in the said benefits is Philippine Crop Insurance Corp.'s (PCIC) Coconut Tree Mortality Insurance for farmers of the crop who either own, rent or operate 5 hectares or less.

Eligible farmers registered in the NCFRS receive free insurance for up to 1 hectare and a built-in death benefit of P10,000, provided the insured farmer is under 80 years old.

PCIC said that it was targeting to cover 400,000 coconut farmers this year. To attain that, all 13 PCIC regional field offices and 55 provincial offices are actively conducting extensive information caravans and mass enrollment activities, in partnership with the PCA.

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