New and improved Palay stat: your one-stop shop for your rice data needs

In national development, the aspirations of a policy is to attain national goals and achieve a fair measure of success. There is a need to map out strategic plans, set up machinery for execution, and monitor the implementation process (Shangodoyin, D.K. and Lasisi, T.A., 2011). This proves that statistics has a vital and relevant role not only in the national development but as well in the countryside level. With this in mind, in 2014, the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) developed and introduced an interactive web-based information system called the Rice-based Socioeconomic Information System (RBSEIS) and later on renamed as PalayStat system. The PalayStat system is created to cater rice researchers and policy makers in need of accessible rice-related information. Since August 2016, PalayStat has been viewed 12,221 times and browsed through 2,360 sessions. Also, the system have received very good ratings from user's feedbacks', averaging 4.74 out of 5. Since PalayStat is an effective tool in providing data to user's feedbacks', averaging 4.74 out of 5. Since PalayStat is an effective tool in providing data to users, additional rice-related information for public consumption were included such as 16 statistical tables from the Statistical Series On The Rice Economy study. These time-series datasets (1970-2014) consist of palay/rice supply and demand, input-use and production costs, returns and losses, and palay/rice marketing covering 83 provinces from 16 regions. In collaboration with the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), these datasets are updated annually both in national and provincial summaries. To further improve the system, additional functionalities were developed such as dynamic search options and broader search keywords, bigger database on publications, maps and other references, and better website design and user-friendly experience. PlayStat aims to be the main one-stop portal for rice researchers on the Philippine rice industry.