About P11.6 billion worth of crops were saved from Typhoon Tisoy because of a number of preparations delivered by the Agriculture Department prior to its landfall.
Agriculture Secretary William Dar said the volume of palay harvested three days before the onslaught of the typhoon translated into about P11.6 billion in cash value.
“We have an operation center at DA where we prepare bulletins based on the reports of PAGASA, and we relay these bulletins to the regions that will potentially be affected by any weather disturbance, “ he said.
The mechanism allowed the department to notify the regional offices, which then alerted the extension workers and technicians on the ground to inform the farmers of the latest weather update.
The early warning mechanism saved about 157,000 hectares of paddy rice from being ravaged by the typhoon.
For corn, about P109 million worth of produce were salvaged from the 2,000 hectares harvested before the typhoon struck.
Typhoon Tisoy, however, caused a spike in the prices of various commodities in the market, including fish and vegetables.
