PCA renews call for group marketing of copra

TACLOBAN CITY, Nov. 28 -- The Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) has reiterated its call to farmers in Eastern Visayas to venture into group marketing in the bid to minimize the impact of fluctuating domestic copra price.

PCA Regional Manager Jeffrey Delos Reyes said farmers will earn more from direct selling of copra to oil mills than through traders based in communities.

“The price difference between oil mills and traders is about PHP7 to PHP8 per kilogram. Even if farmers will spend for logistics, they will still earn more from this marketing arrangement,” Delos Reyes told the Philippine News Agency (PNA) on Wednesday.

Oil mills in Eastern Visayas buys copra at PHP19 per kilogram, more than the PHP12 buying price of traders based in towns and villages.

This year’s copra domestic price is way cheaper than the PHP47 mill gate price and PHP35 farm gate price recorded in November 2017.

“We have been encouraging coconut farmers to work together as an organization and engage in group marketing to be able to negotiate for a better price than the prevailing local buying price,” Delos Reyes said.

Copra price has been going down since trading price is dependent to the coconut oil price in the global market, he said. The international coconut oil trade is determined or affected by the supply and demand situation of other vegetable oils such as oil palm, soybean, rapeseed, sunflower, olive oil, etc.

“Though the Philippines is the biggest exporter of coconut oil in the world, coconut oil’s share is only two percent in the world market. It is just one of the many vegetable oils produced in the world. As such, its price is greatly affected by the movement of prices of other vegetable oils particularly the palm oil and soybean oil,” he added.

Palm oil accounts 35 percent of the internationally traded vegetable oils while soybean oil is the second biggest with a share of 29 percent, Delos Reyes said.

Copra, one of the by-products of coconut, is the dried meat or kernel of the coconut. The oil is extracted from copra. It also yields coconut cake after oil extraction, which is mainly used as feed for livestock.

On Nov. 22, the agriculture department gathered some owners of coconut oil mills in a caucus and solicited their commitment to buy copra directly from organized farmers’ groups instead of middlemen and traders.

Under the direct marketing arrangement, the Department of Agriculture through the Agricultural Credit Policy Council will provide organized coconut farmers groups with working capital to buy the product of members.

This will be delivered directly to the oil mills who will pay the farmers at the price the traders are getting, according to a statement posted on social media by Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol.

The DA will also provide the farmers groups some funds for the purchase of hauling trucks and dryers. The direct marketing arrangement will be implemented before the end of November. (SQM/PNA)