To further enhance services for farmers and fishers, the Department of Agriculture (DA) opened the country’s centralized agriculture data under the Agriculture-based Central Data Ecosystem (AbCDE) Project on Wednesday.

This is still in line with the directives of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. to advance food security and boost agricultural support to local food producers.

The USD3.5-million, or PHP165 million, AbCDE Platform 1.0 project, completed in partnership with the Republic of Korea government through its official development assistance (ODA) program, seeks to advance smart governance in the agriculture sector.

In an interview, DA Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. said the landmark platform enhances the government’s efforts for digitalization, particularly in farmers’ registration and data consolidation across various commodities.

“Yung process natin, definitely bibilis. We should be able to register more, and ‘yung data accuracy, duplication, mababawasan. Then, ‘yung interventions din mapapabilis (The process will be faster. We should be able to register more and for data accuracy, the duplication will be reduced. Then, the interventions will also be accelerated),” he said.

With the system in place, the profiling under the Registry System for Basic Sectors in Agriculture (RSBSA) can now be processed within five minutes, significantly faster than the previous 10-day maximum timeline.

Tiu Laurel said intensified registration validation will be conducted in the coming months while the data population is underway.

“We’ll just focus na ma-prioritize (on prioritizing) several provinces para may magamit tayong (so that we can utilize) actionable data within the next three to four months,” he said.

Korea Agency of Education, Promotion, and Information Service in Food, Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries (EPIS) President Yoon Dong-jin, meanwhile, expressed optimism on the platform’s impact on the welfare of local food producers.

“I believe that the AbCDE platform marks the first step in service change, from data to trust to changed lives of its constituents,” Yoon said.

“The full, accurate, and transparent data will serve as a cornerstone in building trust. And the trust may facilitate consolidated efforts, and opportunity leads to improvement in the lives of farmers.”

To date, the Philippines has about 10.7 million registered farmers and fishers nationwide.

Accelerated services, transparency

Under the AbCDE platform, both parties assured increased reliability in the farmers’ registry, reduced data errors in registration, streamlined subsidy preparation time, and a robust boost in administrative efficiency.

For her part, EPIS Director Lee Jae Eun underscored how the platform has enhanced the country’s digital system for agriculture.

The AbCDE 1.0 has accelerated subsidy preparation to five days from the 26 maximum days, she added.

Tiu Laurel, meanwhile, said the preparation time may even be shorter with more training in regional field offices and local government units (LGUs) across provinces nationwide.

“I believe kaya pang ibaba iyan (that can be lowered), two to three days para mas mabilis ang action ng DA (so that the DA’s action will be faster),” Tiu Laurel said.

Data reliability also is up to 97 percent from 90 percent, alongside intensified digital training.

Besides these, Tiu Laurel also cited data integration of real-time farmgate and retail prices of agricultural commodities in the said platform.

These may include high-value crops like rice, corn, onion, garlic, ginger, tomatoes, sugar, carrot, coconut, as well as fish and meat, among others.

“So this is a tool to get more real-time data as fast as possible to manage food security, prices, and control inflation,” Tiu Laurel said.

Area planted and supply situations may also be integrated to combat possible smuggling, profiteering, and even prevent food spoilage.

“In the future, maiwasan natin ‘yung mga overproduction, underproduction, ‘yung mga tinatapon (we can prevent overproduction, underproduction, and wastage),” Tiu Laurel said.

These data will help prompt appropriate and timely market response and reaction, he said.

Tiu Laurel further said newly live platform is seen to be fully operational by January 2026.

Overall, the AbCDE Platform 1.0 project has consolidated fragmented data into a “unified and high-tech ecosystem” since its initial launch in 2023, according to the DA.

It features improved RSBSA, with accurate data validation and management; a unified and scalable agricultural support system through intervention; analytic data, which prompts smarter decisions through a data-driven approach; and real-time price intelligence under the Bantay-Presyo Monitoring System. (PNA)