Paradigm Shift – Team Philippines Champions The Poor Farmers

The simplest paradigm shift is from thinking negative to thinking positive!

The paradigm shifts
from
leaving the PH Department of Agriculture, DA, alone to work out positive results of the rice crisis,
to
LGUs, SCUs, private sector including NGOs, religious groups and farmer leaders joining forces into Team Philippines not only to survive the crisis but to triumph into inclusive development of whole villages in the countryside from Aparri to Jolo.

"Makiisa Sa Magsasaka" (Be One With The Farmer) and "Support Our Rice Farmers" are good slogans, but not good enough; I will give you just one reason – our farmers produce rice that is not competitive with imported rice; compare now – PH P12/kilo, Vietnam P8/kilo, Thailand P6/kilo. With our higher cost of production, with the cheaper imports, we are losers in our own country!

How to support our rice farmers intelligently?
Be holistic and, among other things, teach them to reduce their costs!

In the top image, I show the upper half of the first book I wrote that was published by the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, ICRISAT, with the title "Team ICRISAT Champions The Poor." My book was published in 2008; I was then an international consulting writer for ICRISAT. The Director General, DG, of ICRISAT at that time was the same man who is the new PH Secretary of Agriculture: William Dar/Manong Willie/Servant-Leader.

I covered ICRISAT from January 2007 to December 2014, when Manong Willie retired, so I know the Institute's history of its rise from the bottom heap to top honors. When our Team Captain became DG of ICRISAT in 2000, the Institute was dead last among the 15 international centers in the group CGIAR, of which IRRI is a member. With their Team Captain, ICRISAT rose to #1 by winning awards after awards – encouraged and enlightened by their Servant-Leader. Nothing beats teamwork with a first-class Team Captain!

So, "Team ICRISAT" is a powerful paradigm to be emulated by Team Philippines. If we leave the DA alone to "do its job mandated by the Constitution," the DA will not succeed.

I know the terms paradigmand paradigm shift are unclear to many people. The simplest equivalent word that I can think of, the way our Team Captain Philippines uses the word paradigmis guide, that is, guide to thought and guide to action.

When Manong Willie speaks, be very sure that he is coming from any of those 8 paradigms. He came up with those 8 even before he was appointed by President Rodrigo Duterte as the new Secretary of Agriculture because that is how his mind works – in wholes. Those 8 paradigms are separate but yet make a whole package of sources of initiatives to bring "Masaganang Ani at Mataas na Kita" (Plenteous Grains & Plentiful Gains, my new translation). (Oh yes, on those paradigms I have produced a literary-literal ebook, in Paradigms Lost, in Paradigms Regained, lower half of above image, a free copy of which you can email me for: frankahilario@gmail.com.)

Let us be w/holistic and be Team Philippines!@517

"PH Agriculture Renaissance Is Nonsense! Idiocy!" – MT Columnist Marlen V Ronquillo; "Name-Calling" – iVirtual Guru Frank A Hilario

Someone emailed me copy-and-paste Marlen V Ronquillo's column today, Sunday, 22 September 2019, at the Manila Times online (manilatimes.net): "Agricultural Renaissance Is Either Official Nonsense Or Punditry's Idiocy."

My intellectual response? It's all argumentum ad hominem, name-calling. Now, says the:

American Heritage Dictionary (thefreedictionary.com), name-calling is "verbal abuse, esp as a crude form of argument."

Macmillan Dictionary(macmillandictionary.com), name-calling is "the act of saying insulting things to or about someone."

Merriam-Webster Dictionary (merriam-webster.com), name-calling is "the use of offensive names especially to win an argument or to induce rejection or condemnation (as of a person or project) without objective consideration of the facts."

Mr Ronquillo's column is all of 933 words including title, and my intelligent appreciation of it is one phrase: attacking the person.

I wonder where Mr Ronquillo studied argumentation in college? I studied mine at the Cow College, that is, the University of the Philippines' College of Agriculture, now UP Los Baños; Mr Bituin from UP Diliman was our visiting professor in Western Thought then and, you know what? He gave me a perfect grade, 1.0! Why? Because I deserved it.

Logical thinking. I have blogged more than 6,000 essays ranging from 500 to 2,000 words each, so I should know how to build my case when I'm arguing a point! Calling on creative thinking, not resorting to personal attack. I thoroughly enjoy my writing when I am trying to "build up a case" because it is all an exercise in fertility!

Name-calling is only one of the logical fallacies everyone should study, but especially journalists. Even before our Mr Bituin, I learned my logical fallacies reading many of the Perry Mason stories of Erle Stanley Gardner from the library of my brother-in-law Manong Mulong Llamas, the husband of Manang Lucing, who was studying law in Dagupan City. Mr Ronquillo's column? "Irrelevant, your Honor."

Now, look at the lower half of the composite image above; it is the cover of my ebook Paradigms Lost, Paradigms Regained, 269 pages, my literary-literal explanation and exposition of Mr Dar's "Eight Paradigms" embodied in his "New Thinking for Agriculture" that he has come up with as his roadbook (my term) to the new PH Agriculture under him as new Secretary of Agriculture. (Email me for a free copy: frankahilario@gmail.com.)

Now, here is to overwhelm Mr Ronquillo with Manong Willie's idealism, not idiocy, with his 8 paradigms:

(1) Modernizing agriculture.
(2) Industrializing agriculture.
(3) Promoting exports.
(4) Consolidating the farms.
(5) Developing roadmaps.
(6) Building infrastructure.
(7) Having higher budgets and investments for agriculture.
(8) Having legislative support.

If Mr Ronquillo does notthink that that will lead to a Renaissance in PH Agriculture, he sees the glass as half-empty, I see it as half-full!

More to the point: Does Mr Ronquillo know the Renaissance in Europe did not occur within only 2 months – Mr Dar started his new job Monday, 05 August 2019 – but within 4 centuries?! (Wikipedia, en.wikipedia.org).

I have Faith in the Renaissance that is coming to PH Agriculture!@517

Innovation In PH Agriculture, And PRRD Knows One: Dalisay Rice

Update: From the new head of the PH Department of Agriculture, DA, new added instruction, 21 September 2019: 

"DA must be an institution of Innovation" –
William Dar/Manong Willie.
I say, Yes Sir!

Image above: President Rodrigo Roa Duterte applauds as he unveils the marker of the revolutionary Dalisay rice processing system during its inauguration in Alangalang, Leyte 05 July 2019 (photo by Valerie Escalera, pcoo.gov.ph).

From Paris had come the innovative idea of a peasant & pleasant rice, from India innovative partnership & public servant-leadership – and on 11 September 2019, they united to make exciting news in the dull Philippine science scene.

Together, physically they launched Dalisay Rice by the Renuccis. In reality, they also launched #1 of Manong Willie's Eight Paradigms of the New PH Agriculture:

Modernizing Agriculture.

Innovation with investments from the private sector; the owners & creators of Dalisay Rice, Patrick & Rachel Renucci, have invested a billion or two PH pesos on the overall business undertaking, innovating as they decided to leave glitzy Paris and come and live in grassy Leyte in the middle of the Philippine islands starting 2015.

And so Wednesday, 11 September 2019, Patrick & Rachel Renucci launched their Dalisay Rice at the ballroom of the Grand Hyatt Manila in Bonifacio Global City, Taguig, Metro Manila.

Innovation from the top

The guest speaker was the 1 month-old Secretary of Agriculture William Dar, whose innovative science management fame precedes him, being the only 3-term Director General, DG, of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, ICRISAT, from January 2000 to December 2014, and Secretary of Agriculture under President Joseph Estrada. As Team Captain, he made ICRISAT #1 among the 15 international science centers in the CGIAR group. As Secretary of Agriculture, he made the unenviable record of the highest PH aggie growth of 9.6% ever!

Even before PRRD appointed him Secretary of Agriculture, he already had revolutionized PH Agriculture with his own Roadbook (my term), calling it "The New Thinking for Agriculture," embedding The Eight Paradigms necessary "to level up" PH agriculture. (Lower half of image above, I have written a book on the paradigms – titled in Paradigms Lost, in Paradigms Regained – which you can have free if you email me, frankahilario@gmail.com.)

Innovation from below

From Paris with love have come the Renuccis, designing from scratch what I now call the Farmer-Businessmind-Technology-Market Approach for PH Agriculture, where instead of the farmholdings, you consolidate the inputs, throughputs and outputs forward to the finished product. This is looking at the scene from the farmer's field.

The Renuccis have indeed modernized not only on Philippine agriculture but global agriculture – a new system of coming up with a product that socializes the values along the chain from seed to spoon.

Mr Dar is not new to innovation. As Director General of ICRISAT, he introduced the concept of inclusive market-oriented development, IMOD, where the poor farmers are treated fairly and rewarded squarely for their labors.

As it turns out, without realizing it, the Renuccis have applied IMOD in coming up with Dalisay Rice. Mabuhay!@517 

Frank A Hilario Teaches Thinking – Because You Are Not!

Happy Birthday! to me Tuesday, 17 September 2019, your iVirtual Guru – but only if you are willing to learn, if you open your mind to limitless possibilities. 

Have you given the new Secretary of Agriculture, William Dar/Manong Willie the benefit of the doubt?

At least 2 years before he became Secretary of Agriculture, as President of the InangLupa Movement, Mr Dar was already into partnering (ANN, 14 April 2017, Go Negosyo, "An Agricultural Take On MSME Development With Dr William Dar," gonegosyo.net), envisioning "a food secure, resilient, and prosperous Philippines" and launching with Go Negosyo the Young Entrepreneur-Farmers Philippines, its mission being "to mentor and empower young farmers to become successful entrepreneurs in high-value agriculture."

We have to open our minds to other possibilities!

I learned my best lesson in opening wide one's mind from Edward De Bono's book Mechanism Of Mind when my good friend Orli Ochosa (God bless his soul!) gifted me with a copy when we were copywriters of Pacifica Publicity Bureau of the famed Tony Zorilla, in 1974. De Bono's mind trick was to say to any idea that comes up in any brainstorming, "Po" – meaning, the Power of Possibility, even if the idea sounds badat first. It works, as my own creative thinking has shown over the last 44 years – as proven by 5,000 or so long essays (at least twice longer than this) I have blogged since 2005.

In the above image, note that it says below, "ELN2019" – it was Edsel De Leon Natividad, and my daughter J Claire acknowledges it, who created this acrostic. And Edsel is the one saying, in his own posting of this, "Here's for the 79th birthday of the most prolific and creative Filipino writer I know. May you have more stories to write."

I was forced to post this myself because I can see that too many professionals, successful in farming beyond their formal education, along with some fine graduates of agriculture, incessantly complaining on Facebook and airing their dissatisfaction of the current PH situation.

Who is happy with what is happening to Philippine agriculture right now?!

And how come you do not see that the entire Department of Agriculture, DA, with new management, is doing everything it can to bring prosperity to the farmers who have never experienced it before!?

And you yourself, what have you been doing aside from pointing out that the glass is half-empty?!

This early, 0520 hours of Saturday, 21 September 2019 in Manila, I am finally forced to write this because in the past few days, I have noticed many professionals, including successful businessmen, never mind who they are, posting on Facebook only the negative.

Another way of putting it is that yes, gentlemen, you have been doing critical thinking! You have the right to do critical thinking – but you also have the duty to do creative thinking.

Gentlemen, what you have been doing to promote not merely individual or institutional but also inclusive growth in PH Agriculture? Don't tell me you can't think of anything positive for others!@517

PH Louise Mabulo – Young Chef Succeeds In The Old Ways Of Cacao Farming

Kristine Sabillo has the good news: "Pinay Chef Bags UN Award For Helping Bicol Farmers" (18 September 2019, ABS-CBN News, news.abs-cbn.com). The contest is called "Young Champions of the Earth" and the individual prize is US$15,000, or P784,000, to be awarded by the United Nations Environment Programme, UNEP in New York. Of the 7 global young winning entrepreneurs, 20-year-old Filipino junior master chef Louise Mabulo is the awardee for Asia-Pacific. 

Unique! A chef who is a farmer who is an entrepreneur. And inspiring. Youth entrepreneurship in agriculture is one of the many goals for PH Agriculture under "The Eight Paradigms" embedded in "The New Thinking for Agriculture" by new PH Secretary of Agriculture William Dar; the lower image above is the title of my ebook of 79 short essays, each a literary-literal information & interpretation of a paradigm, or guide to action. (You can email me for a free copy: frankahilario@gmail.com.) 

How is it that a young Bicolana chef is a uniquely successful cacao farmer? In Louise's "Cacao Project," UNEP recognizes her practical and unique experience starting with a typhoon relief project after Typhoon Nina ravaged her home province Camarines Sur in 2016. If you care enough, you can be the best of whatever you want to be!

The Cacao Project has so far trained 200 farmers in agroforestry, and planted more than 70,000 trees in 70 hectares. The UNEP recognizes this as uniquely "taking action to address climate change."

Aside: As far as I an agriculturist am concerned, "agroforestry" here is a misnomer, because the practice is actually growing garden crops like cacao (horticulture) being nursed by tree crops (forestry). Why not call it garden forestry? 

Kristine says Louise started her project by buying cacao seedlings with her own savings plus some donations. "While she was focused on her career as a chef, she started going into farming and agriculture as part of her (adventure into) sustainable food value chains." And that was when Louise "realized how unsustainable it was for farmers in Bicol to continue planting crops (meaning, coconuts) that were not climate-resilient." Kristine quotes Louise as saying:

We realized we can't just weather through the yearly typhoon. Coconut trees would take another 5 years (to mature). We had to think of something more resilient and something more profitable for the farmers and with demand for the market.

And, Kristine says, Louise "discovered that the cacao tree was just the right height to withstand strong winds." Not too tall. Actually, I as an agriculturist who also worked as an Editor in Chief in forestry publications, learned that the coconut trees also "protect" the cacao underneath – they are only performing their role as "nurse trees."

Louise noted that it took a cacao tree about 3 years to bear fruit, so her Cacao Project provided cash crops for the farmers to earn while waiting for their cacao. Good thinking, girl! 

Kristine says, Louise's "dream is to make cacao farming an 'art form' that will be as attractive as wine and vineyards." Bright thinking, girl!@517

WTF! Inquirer

Yes, today, I am crowning The Inquirer "The Swine King."

For its king-size PH story on the Asian swine fever.
A pig, a pig, a kingdom for a pig!
WTF!

I woke up past two this morning, Friday, 20 September 2019, and among my first thoughts was WTF! Was Thinking For, WTF, myself. WTF, I was thinking of what would I be dedicating the rest of my life to – from 79 years old last 17 September, to 120, God willing.

Of course, the first meaning of WTF is: What the fuck?!

WTF! Here are synonyms: "What the Hell!" "What on Earth!" "What in God's name!" and "Bullshit!"

Now comes, at about 4 AM, the sharing of Bruce Tolentino on Facebook of an image of the print edition of the Philippine Daily Inquirer (image above I screen-grabbed from the online edition). Because the headline is exactly what you see above, I crown The Inquirer The Swine King (pig icon from Aha-Soft, iconfinder.com).

Read the headline again – WTF! This is scary. This is deadly news! On Mr Tolentino's Facebook post, former UPLB Planning & Development Vice Chancellor Fermin D Adriano's first words in his comment are these:

This is what you call grossly irresponsible journalism, verging on the malicious. First, the headline does not reflect the content of the news wherein the deaths of the swine happened only between Aug 30 and Sept 12. It gives the impression that we have reached epidemic level. Total reported deaths of swine in China is more than a million within a one year period. Second, by sensationalizing (the) story, it hurts our entire hogs industry (that) is worth around P260 billion.

Well, Sir, that is WTF! Reporting. Our journalists, Filipinos here and Americans there, have notgraduated from stretching-the-truth just to sell the paper.

This incredible magnification of the news throws hog manure on the Inquirer's own slogan, "Balanced News, Fearless Views." That swine story is fearless views but not balanced news!

In fact, the authors of the news report, Germelina Lacorte, Matthew Reysio-Cruz and Ronnel W Domingo, their editor, and even the Inquirer management itself, will tell you that Truth is their objective. I am willing to grant that. Of course, I remember Pontius Pilate asking, "What is Truth?" but not staying for an answer. When at last you find the Truth, you are actually just beginning your journalism!

2 years ago, for my self-styled journalism, I adopted Zig Ziglar's mantra of what I call Truth THiNK!

True is it? If True,
Helpful is it? If Helpful,
Inspiring is it? If Inspiring,
Necessary is it? If Necessary,
Kind is it?

Journalism for Truth-Without-Thinking is easy – any fool can write it and any other fool can publish it.

I have a blog I call Truth THINK (https://itruththink.blogspot.com) where I first published my essay along these lines: "I, Teacher. Thinking How To Teach The US Media How To Think!" 06 February 2017, itruththink.blogspot.com). Above, read Zig Ziglar again.

Now then, this Inquirer hogwash has made my mind up – I am dedicating the rest of my life to WTF! – Writer, Teacher, Friend!@517

Yentrepreneurs – The Youth Are The Hopes Of The Father's Land

"With technology and agripreneurship," says William Dar in his Manila Timescolumn of today ("Attracting More Young Blood Into Agriculture" 2nd of 2 Parts (19 September 2019, Manila Times, manilatimes.net), "we could change the way the youth perceive farming." I agree, and I call the young entrepreneurs, yentrepreneurs– now we have to put in the youth the yen, or yearning, for agriculture.

As PH Secretary of Agriculture, Mr Dar is talking about youth entrepreneurship as avenue for carrying out 1 of his 8 paradigms for the New PH Agriculture: #1, modernizing agriculture. Since the concept of paradigms is new to agriculture here (even abroad), I decided to help by explaining in 79 short essays in my literal-literary ebook, Paradigms Lost, Paradigms Regained (267 pages, a free copy for you if you email me: frankahilario@gmail.com).

Has any PH agency been trying to attract the youth to rice farming? Googling, I found a likely attempt by PhilRice, reported by Jaime A Manalo IV in 2016, "Youth & Agriculture: The Infomediary Campaign In The Philippines" (downloadable as pdf, 172 pages; above image from the publication); unfortunately, it did not pursue youth entrepreneurship.

Mr Dar says, "The move to introduce mechanization measures in Thailand's agriculture comes at a time when the country is urging more of its youth to take up farming." Also, Thailand has the Dare to Return initiative, Mr Dar says. Dare to Return has attracted the young ones from the rural as well as the urban areas to engage in farming. In the Philippines, he says, the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Program, RCEP, with P5 billion allotted to it yearly for the next 6 years, following the Rice Tariffication Law, "could serve as one of the main take-off points to technologize the country's farming sector, which would be pivotal in attracting more young people into agriculture."

Mr Dar is also thinking about the State Colleges & Universities, SCUs, dealing with agribusiness incubation, ABI – ABI worked for the Indians via the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, ICRISAT, when he was the Director General from 2000 to 2014; ICRISAT is based in India. The public & private sectors can help the SCUs there.

Mr Dar also suggests what should be exciting to the youth – the use of PC tablets and smartphones to run farm tractors. Differently, I am thinking more of using PC tablets as touch-screen digital libraries for data, information, technologies and systems in farming and gardening. That of course will need prior computer programming.

In June 2 years ago, when UP President Alfredo Pascual urged the UP Diliman graduates "to be the nation's hope" (see my essay, "Knowledge Revolution: What Does UP Know?" Creativity Works! icreativityworks.blogspot.com), I proposed that UP Los Baños ask more funds from the Secretary of Agriculture to build a knowledge base on agriculture written in popular English. I was already thinking of attracting high school students to agriculture via their love for technology – hence my choice of the PC tablet, never mind the cellphone:

When we cultivate Agriculture, we should cultivate Class!@517