2. COCONUT AREAS
• 68 out of 79 provinces; 1,195 out of 1,634 cities & municipalities
• 26% of the total agricultural land is coconut plantation,
equivalent to 3.562 million hectares
PRODUCTION & EARNINGS
• 340 million bearing coconut trees producing an average
of 15.2 billion nuts per year
• 23% of world’s coconut production
• 3rd largest exporter of coconut in the world, with 59%
of all exports
• Earn US$ 935million from coconut oil in 2005-2009.
• Coconut oil is the country’s TOP agricultural commodity
export.
3. COCONUT AREAS
COCO FARMERS’ SITUATION
• Small coconut farmers earn only P3 per nut
• 41% out of more than half a million coconut farm house
holds are poor
• 240,424 coconut farm families live in poverty, earning
below P16,842 per year
• Income of copra-based farmers is around P10,400/ha/year.
Minus inputs and labor cost, copra farmers
take home only P6,765/ha/year
• At current incomes, a copra farmer must own at least 10
hectares of land to get out of poverty
4. • Underemployment among coconut farmers, whose work
is largely informal, unpaid and subsistence-based, is
at 65.9%. High poverty incidence among coconut
growers highly correlates with grave conditions of
underemployment in the country.
• The provinces in Calabarzon are plagued with coconut
insect infestation
• Coconut farmers have yet to recover from the
onslaught of strong typhoons Pablo and Yolanda,
which hit coconut areas in Visayas and Mindanao
Source: 2009 FIES-LFS, PCA, DA-BAS
