Those in charge of the productive units of the agricultural sector are aging. More than 30 percent of farmers are over 65 years of age.
In 2022, agricultural areas that were not cultivated were reported because there was no one to work them.
For the Mexican Union of Manufacturers and Formulators of Agrochemicals (UMFFAAC), the threat of the aging of rural producers must be faced now because otherwise, the foundation of food production and the hope of food self-sufficiency of the country.
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The president of the UMFFAAC, Luis Eduardo González Cepeda, explained in an interview that this phenomenon, far from being reduced, will increase year after year, because according to the 2022 National Agricultural Census, 78 percent of those responsible for production units have more 45 years old.
According to this INEGI document, 30.9 percent of the producers are over 65 years of age.
In addition, 25,891 hectares were recorded that were not planted due to various factors, among them, because there was no one to plant them, due to bad weather, lack of credit, illness, lack of support or money.
Engineer González Cepeda explained that national statistics from INEGI itself show that between 1970 and 2023, the percentage of the population aged 0 to 14 decreased from 46 to 23 percent and that of 15 to 29 years went from 26 to 24 percent. .
While the adult population from 30 to 64 years old increased from 24 to 43 percent; but the percentage of older adults more than doubled from 4 to 10 percent.
In turn, he commented that the Center for Studies for Sustainable Rural Development of the Chamber of Deputies, points out in a study that in the year 2000, the adult population aged 65 or over in the rural sector amounted to 4.6 million Mexicans, 4.7 percent of the total.
Ten years later it reached 7.1 million and by 2014 it increased to 8.5 million people, representing 7.1 percent of the total national population.
Given this panorama of population aging, it is necessary to reinforce the fundamental pillars in order not to lose the future of the countryside: implement public policies aimed at boosting productivity with profitability for farmers.
This with the aim of attracting young people and people of productive age to the agricultural activity that is essential.
Regarding the issue of education, half of the producers only have primary education, this is 50.6 percent, which reduces or limits their access to new technologies as well as their integration into new production or market processes.
That allow them to develop the necessary potential to be profitable and compete in various markets: local, state, regional or national, said González Cepeda.
He pointed out that the future of the countryside must be based on public policies that promote modernization and mechanization, whether with tractors, machinery, irrigation, among others, or scientific ones such as technological packages that range from improved seeds, fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides, and other agrochemicals that allow produce more and better.
It is not possible to continue with a clientelist public policy that is based on social support that is not enough to keep young people in the production units and, on the contrary, takes them away from the fields to send them far from home, towards the United States.
Hence the growth of remittances, a fact that cannot be presumed but is cause for concern, because it is a reflection of the abandonment of the countryside in Mexico.
He also expressed: “We also see the appearance of radical groups within the institutions of the federal Public Administration, which without any scientific information, try to ban tools such as glyphosate.”
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It is a herbicide that has been used for more than 50 years in the country and is one of the few options known for its efficiency and profitability. “The ideologization of the agricultural sector has now become a serious mistake that threatens to reduce agricultural productivity.”
Since it acts to dismantle the institutions of the field, eliminate productive support and reduce the tools available to all producers. This will surely reduce food production, said the president of the UMFFAAC.
2023-08-03 20:58:53
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