A Negros Occidental lawmaker is pushing for a state of calamity assessment and the immediate formation of a provincial task force to combat a rapidly spreading infestation of the Red-Striped Soft Scale Insect (RSSI), which has more than doubled its reach to over 4,800 hectares in the Visayas in less than a week.
“We would like the governor to take the lead because this is not just an agricultural problem after a while, it’s going to become an economic and a social order problem,” Rep. Emilio Bernardino L. Yulo (Neg. Occ., 5th District) said on Friday, June 19.
“RSSI is no longer an isolated or temporary pest infestation. It has become a perennial problem that continues to threaten the stability of the sugar industry in Negros Occidental. This requires not only immediate intervention, but a coordinated, institutionalized, and long-term response,” he said.
Yulo also urged the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, concerned LGUs, and other concerned agencies to immediately conduct a comprehensive assessment of the damage caused by RSSI and determine whether the legal and technical conditions warrant the declaration of a State of Calamity in severely affected areas.
He said such a declaration, if warranted, would help mobilize emergency resources, expedite interventions, and make available necessary assistance to affected farmers, sugar planters, and sugar-producing communities.
This would allow local governments to allocate funds for pesticides to aid small farmers, he said.
Yulo said he has also received reports of fall armyworms hitting sugarcane fields.
The RSSI infestation has entered an accelerated phase across the Visayas, with affected areas having more than doubled to 4,847.63 hectares in six days, the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) reported on Thursday, June 18.
Southern Negros Occidental remains the epicenter of the outbreak, accounting for approximately half of the total infested areas, it said.
Yulo called on the Negros Occidental provincial government, the Department of Agriculture (DA), SRA, the Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI), Land Bank of the Philippines, concerned Local Government Units, and other relevant national and local agencies to immediately convene and institutionalize a Provincial Inter-Agency Task Force on RSSI.
He also urged sugar mills, Mill District Development Councils, planters’ associations, farmers’ cooperatives, academic and research institutions, private sector partners, and other public and private organizations to actively participate in a united response against the infestation.
The SRA alone cannot address this because of the magnitude of the problem. A concerted and deliberate effort is needed, Yulo said.
The proposed task force should serve as the central coordinating body for province-wide monitoring, mapping, containment, pest management, technical assistance, farmer education, rehabilitation, and recovery efforts, he said.
“The fight against RSSI cannot be carried by farmers alone. It requires the collective action of government agencies, local governments, the sugar industry, financial institutions, scientific experts, farmers’ organizations, and the private sector. A whole-of-province and whole-of-industry approach is necessary,” Yulo said.
Yulo assured affected farmers that he will continue to advocate for the necessary technical, financial, and policy interventions needed to combat the infestation and secure the long-term sustainability of the sugar industry in Negros Occidental.
“Now is the time for decisive and coordinated action. We must act immediately before this threat develops into a full-blown agricultural and economic crisis,” Yulo said.*
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