The adoption of new but interested to help improve farm yields and increase farm income is expected to further boost the strategy of the Arroyo administration in the creation of six million new jobs in the agriculture sector in the next six years.

Agriculture Undersecretary and food security and jobs creation head Theresa Cruz-Capellan said the strategy would ensure that farm productivity would contribute to President Arroyo's food security goals while perking up countryside economies.

Capellan said her office had already pin-pointed three farm technologies that would catalyze farm productivity and create jobs, namely hybrid corn, hybrid rice and Chinese-bred hogs.

Capellan is slated to head a delegation of farmer-leaders in a visit to China this week to take a first-hand look at new developments in these technologies. Joining Capellan in the visit are Rod Bioco, Philmaize president; Albert Lim, president of the Philippine Hog Raisers Federation, and Henry Lim, leader of the hybrid rice seed sector.

Capellan ssaid the country's experience in using the Chinese hybrid rice since 2002 had resulted in an increase of one job for every two hectares planted to hybrid rice. The national average yield of hybrid rice is about 220 cavans per hectare, a big improvement from the certified seeds' average yield of 50 cavans per hectare, she said.

This year, the DA is planting hybrid rice to 150,000 hectares during the wet season, and another 200,000 hectares for the dry season, or a total of 350,000 hectares. This is expected to create an estimated 23,842 jobs throughout the country.

Capellan said that for 2005, the DA is targeting another 400,000 hectares, a dn a resulting increase in the job count to 44,649.