Abstract
Rice is, in terms of tonnage, the dominant crop produced for domestic consumption in the Philippines. In fact, about one-quarter of cultivated land in the Philippines is devoted to rice production. Rice is grown in all the regions in the Philippines, with the major regions of rice production (over 60,000 metric tonnes per region) being Ilocos, Cagayan Valley, Central Luzon, Southern Tagalog and Ricol in the Luzon area, Western Visayas in the Visayas area and the Central Mindanao area (see Figure 8.1). There are three distinct rice environments: irrigated lowlands, fainfed lowlands and rainfed uplands. Statistics, however, are classified only by irrigated and rainfed areas (both lowlands and highlands). In 1989,59 per cent of the total rice harvested area was irrigated, and yielded about 69.7 per cent of the total pallay output (pallay is unprocessed rice, known as 'paddy' in some parts of Asia).