Economic effects of pesticide regulation and farmers' education on rice production in Nueva Ecija (Philippines)

The effects of regulatory program for pesticides and farmers' education through Farmers' Field Schools (FFS) on the pattern of pesticide use at the macro and micro levels were determined. Insecticide use in the country generally has been increasing as indicated by rising imports and sales in the 1990s. Government tariff and pricing policies reduced the disincentive to use chemicals in agricultural production as indicated by decreasing implicit tariff but provided higher potential incentive to domestic formulation as indicated by an increasing effective protection rate. Nevertheless, the government appeared to have been successful in minimizing the availability and use of extremely hazardous chemicals in favor of least toxic ones through regulation. At the farm level, regulation had changed the pattern of pesticide use of farmers; from monocrotophos and endosulfan to other chemicals of lower toxicity but this required higher volume to compensate for lower potency and attain the equivalent level of pest control. Farmers' education as a complementary policy had reduced pesticide use because of better understanding of economic threshold level of insect population. The aggregate cost of material inputs and net income above material cost of farmers were not reduced significantly. But if net income could be improved through appropriate input and pricing policies, there would be incentive to continually adopt IPM [integrated pest management] technology rather than solely chemical control. In the long run, this could result in healthier population and safer environment. The favorable impact of education on yield tends to be comulative based on the estimated bio-economic and Cobb-Douglas production functions using 1997 data. Through time, farmers gained more knowledge and better understanding of the dynamics of the ecosystem that improved their decision-making ability to enhance yield. In view of the positive impact of farmers' education under continued regulation of harmful chemicals, the government needs to strengthen its efforts to educate more farmers from other areas and in other crops on IPM technology through FFS