Small brains are never beautiful

By Cesar Ilao III

THE Second Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM II) rang the alarm in June over the stunting rate among Filipino children under five (0-59 months), which recorded its first increase in a decade. In other words, one in four Filipino children is stunted.

No matter how much we spend on new classrooms and teachers, it all amounts to little if a child is already stunted before even entering school. Lest anyone reduce the problem to merely having “low height” for someone’s age, let me emphasize its gravity in two words: permanent impairment.

As a reflection of chronic undernutrition, stunting irreversibly limits a child’s physical growth and brain development. We’re not merely talking about a material lack that can eventually be overcome, but about consigning an entire generation to begin life at a biological disadvantage.

In an era marked by labor disruption, disinformation, and the need for lifelong learning, how can we naively expect a child to succeed if their brain — the very source of human capital — is already failing them? Stunted children will find it significantly harder to read properly and think for themselves. They are also far less likely, on average, to develop the cognitive skills needed to master complex tasks or to reach higher levels of educational and professional attainment as adults.

Two interrelated factors primarily explain child stunting: high food prices and low agricultural productivity. The poorest Filipino households spend around 60-70% of their income on food. That alone suggests how unaffordable food has become for many households. Our pork prices are roughly twice those of Thailand and Vietnam. Our chicken prices are 40% higher than Vietnam’s. Philippine sugar, which is an input in many food products, costs twice the world market price. When nutritious food prices are high, parents are more likely to buy less meat, vegetables, and fruit, offsetting the loss with more rice and, worse, cheaper junk food. Such a diet does not provide the balanced nutrition a growing child needs.

The data cited by EDCOM II point to the importance of a child’s first 1,000 days, when critical developmental processes take place. But high food prices are driving families into survival mode, robbing many children of the nutrition they need during the most important stage of their development.

Productivity-wise, one in four Filipino workers is in agriculture, despite the sector contributing only 8% of GDP. Our twin problems of food inflation and low productivity are largely due to our short-sighted and protectionist agricultural policy.

The Department of Agriculture’s (DA) budget remains rice-centric, with 60% going to rice and leaving little for other commodities with high export potential. Clearly, we remain enamored with the fantasy of rice self-sufficiency, even though the Philippines has no strong comparative advantage in rice production relative to our neighbors. Our archipelagic geography cannot match the vast plains of the Mekong Delta in Vietnam or the Chao Phraya Basin in Thailand.

We should instead focus on food security, which means having reliable access to sufficient, safe, nutritious, and affordable food. Our investment must go towards where productivity gains are greatest across the food system — not just in rice. Rice is also a relatively low-value crop. Every peso devoted to chasing self-sufficiency is a peso not invested in higher-value commodities such as fruits, vegetables, cacao, coffee, coconut, and fisheries, where the Philippines has stronger growth and export opportunities.

Additionally, the DA’s decision to once again increase rice tariffs only worsens the burden on households. Rice tariffs are, in essence, a tax on consumers that eats into what little budget families have left. Even Vietnam, which supplies around 80% of our rice imports, has grown frustrated with our ever-changing rice tariff regime. The same protectionist mindset is evident in our corn policy. Corn accounts for roughly 50-65% of animal feed formulations, making it a major driver of livestock production costs. According to the Philippine Institute for Development Studies, lowering corn prices would reduce pork and chicken production costs, ultimately making these important sources of protein more affordable for families.

Furthermore, our Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) reduced average farm size to 0.83 hectares, dragging productivity down with it. No wonder farmers — aging, and often having finished only Grade 4 — are giving up on agriculture. If one accepts that the learning crisis is fundamentally agricultural, then making food more affordable is, in essence, an education policy. This means keeping rice tariffs low and rejecting arbitrary import bans.

We must liberalize the importation of key food items such as corn and sugar to free Filipino families from being held hostage by artificially high prices. A serious education agenda will only be made possible by a food policy that keeps staples and protein affordable rather than shielding politically favored producers from competition.

But liberalization alone is not enough if we leave farmers trapped in low-productivity agriculture. We must shift agricultural policy away from rice self-sufficiency and toward modernization. The DA must stop pouring the bulk of its budget into rice and instead invest in a wider range of crops and livestock.

Ube (purple yam) is another missed opportunity in the making. We could have invested in ube R&D long before the global craze, but now our neighbors Vietnam and China seem poised to overtake us in both production and innovation.

At the same time, Congress must confront the damage to productivity and farmer incomes caused by decades of land fragmentation under CARP. It should raise the five-hectare ownership limit so that farmers who want to expand can legally buy neighboring farms and cultivate larger areas. Land fragmentation is a root cause of our low productivity, higher production costs, and ultimately, more expensive food prices. A farmer with less than a hectare of land will find it impractical, if not absurd, to invest in tractors and drones. The productivity gains would be too small to justify the cost.

Our decades of “protecting” farmers from competition have left them impoverished. Meanwhile, our children are paying the price for our obsession with E.F. Schumacher’s idea that “small is beautiful” in agriculture.

But small brains are never beautiful.

Cesar Ilao III is a researcher and communications specialist for the Foundation for Economic Freedom (FEF). He is a lecturer at the University of the Philippines and was formerly a researcher at Monash University, Australia.