Two-stage grain drying in the Philippines

Grain drying is a major issue in all grain-producing countries and presents particular problems in humid, tropical climates. ACIAR and PCARRD, in association with other Philippine research organisations, have supported a major effort in this area. The review indicated that the technologies developed in these projects had not been adopted and that little use was being made of them in the Philippines, however the same technologies had been adopted in other collaborating countries in the Asian region and in Australia. Therefore it was decided that the assessment resources should be used to look in detail at the reasons for this lack of adoption and impact. This report presents the results of this assessment study. It found that the structure of the grain industry in the Philippines, and the policy and institutional environment there, are such that the grain-trading industry remains dominated by small-scale operators. As a consequence, economies of scale do not exist in grain trading, and the grain-drying technologies developed are therefore currently not profitable.

The study provides some very useful lessons for guiding future investments in research, in particular the need to take local industry and policy conditions into account when developing research activities.