Philippines Plays Down El Nino Effect

Philippines Department of Agriculture (DA) Undersecretary Bernie Fondevilla has scaled down his earlier estimate that a total of 620,000 hectares of rice fields would be hit by the El Niño phenomenon.

Speaking to reporters, the minister said that the latest data indicated that only a total of 300,000 hectares of rice farms would be affected by the phenomenon, which was welcome news for the rice farmers across the nation.

Fondevilla revealed that the Department of Agriculture (DA) based its earlier assessment that the dry spell would affect 620,000 hectares and 2.36 million MT of paddy rice valued at P40 billion on preliminary data.