Agri-tourism: Antidote to rural exodus

More or less, one-third of our labor force is in the agriculture sector. Considering that it only contributes about 11 percent to our Gross Domestic Product, agriculture happens to be the most inefficient sector of our economy. Worse, it might be deserted in the future.

To recall, several years ago, a report revealed that even agriculture graduates disdain farming. A Filipino sociologist has observed that “Most agriculture graduates do everything but farm; they take government jobs, teach, do research, etc. They don’t want to touch the soil.”  Worst, agricultural workers are dwindling every year as most of them, as surveyed by the Food and Agricultural Organization, migrate to urban areas seeking for better paying jobs. Some, in fact, are working as mere household helpers because, to most of them, these jobs have given them better rewards than that of the farms.

Yes, we’ve seen migration for years now. Even before the Middle Eastern countries started to explore their oil reserves and have attracted thousands of Filipinos, migration was already considered the most preferred option amongst us. Today, it is even becoming more popular. We called it rural exodus or rural flight.

More prevalent now, rural exodus or rural flight refers to migratory patterns that normally happen in a depressed region or province. Due to limited opportunities, there tends to be a movement of people from the rural areas to the urban areas. The search for better lives has always been their common denominator.

In both instances, the advent of modern technology has been the biggest contributor to this phenomenon. News or reports about progressive cities and the better lives of their inhabitants (true or not) can be heard or seen right in theirs or their neighbors’ living rooms.  Naturally, the dream to try their luck mounts.

Also, the advancement of communication technology made it easy for these hopefuls to make decisions. Though they have to leave their families for the time being, the portability of their best communication equipment made them more comfortable even if they are far away.  They are fully aware that knowing their families’ well-being is just a call away.

Indeed, while the availability of real-time communication benefitted the majority of the country’s population in many ways, it has also somehow hastened rural exodus. Consequently, congestion in the urban areas is sickening and inactivity in the countryside is deafening. Worse, both situations have added concerns on criminality in the urban areas and non-productivity in the countryside.

However, despite these conveniences, most rural folks will definitely stay where they are if opportunities to earn are present and reachable. When all the necessities like food, shelter, clothing as well as health and school facilities are available they shall surely stay put. Thus, having undertakings that directly relate to what they are doing right now that may uplift their well-being might be tenable. One of these could be agri-tourism.

Undeniably, world tourism (which is now more than 1 billion tourist arrivals), in general, continue to grow. To tap this growing market, however, there are just a few challenges that we have to address to. For one, while we placed 74th in the 2015 TTCR Survey, we went down five notches in 2017 to 79th. While the report took note of our rich natural resources (37th) and high price competitiveness (22nd) categories, we ranked miserably on areas of efficiency of ground support which is a result of reduced government budgets (107th, losing 14 places).

Moreover, due probably to the Bohol and the Marawi City incidents, security concerns remain high (126th). Clearly, therefore, as we are ranked poorly in the latter categories, we placed 79th overall.

However, we now have a tourism czar in Bernadette Romulo-Puyat who used to be an undersecretary of the Department of Agriculture. Absolutely, we have someone calling the shots at the tourism department who has greater understanding of this initiative. In fact, as we speak, she has vigorously endorsed agri-tourism. Reportedly, she has already “accredited farms that tourists can go to and experience agriculture."

Moreover, if the local government units will support this initiative, then its funds may be realigned to focus more on infrastructure development to make these places of interests accessible to tourists. Likewise, if our military and the national police will be able to address peace and order issues in the countryside, then, probably, agri-tourism will have better chances to flourish and rural folks might just stay put.