A REVIEW of policy is ongoing to make agriculture more attractive to foreign direct investment (FDI), with a view to supporting the sector’s modernization, the Department of Agriculture (DA) said.
Agriculture Secretary William D. Dar said during a virtual 9th Session of the Economic Fora organized by the Department of the Interior and Local Government on Sept. 17: “Foreign investments are an integral part of an open and effective global economic system, and a major catalyst for modernization and development.”
He called for policy to “stimulate the flow of resources, and improve government support for the provision of fiscal, financial, technical, or technological investment.”
“Here is where decisive and immediate action is needed. Many of the laws and policies that currently govern FDI into this country’s agriculture no longer serve the sector’s present needs — unsuited as they are to the requisites of economic growth in a time of national crisis,” Mr. Dar said.
“As modernization and industrialization are two of the four major pillars of the department’s reform agenda, the DA will continue to (facilitate) raising capital for the agriculture sector, and FDI is vital to this process,” he added. — Revin Mikhael D. Ochave