A notable performance in the agricultural sector and increased investment levels were exhibited in CY 2012 as compared to 2011’s.

Agriculture remained to be the main economic activity of the region. In particular, the production level of palay increased by 13.09%. The province of Isabela posed the highest contribution with a 50.16% share from the total actual harvest of 2,425, 432MT in the region. The yield improved from 3.81MT/Ha in CY 2011 to 4.06MT Ha during the year. Said increases were attributed to higher area harvested, good weather condition, and increased cropping intensity. Likewise, corn production also grew by 17.1%, with productivity (yield per hectare) making a 14.51% increase. The increment came from the recovered losses brought by a series of calamities last year, the sustained use of certified and hybrid seeds, continuous supply of irrigation water, and expansion of area plantations.
However, vegetable production decreased by 3.5%, but was cushioned by increases in fruit production by 6.7% from a total of 396, 306.8MT. Major fruits include banana, calamansi, mango and pineapple. The priority fruits such as balimbing, durian, lanzones, papaya, rambutan, tamarind, watermelon, mandarin and orange also showed increased production.

Meanwhile, livestock and poultry showed production gains with the following increases: cattle by 6.10%, swine by 3.35%, goat by 0.54%, and chicken by 10.19%. For the fisheries sector, the production unfortunately declined by 7.56% at a total of only 59, 968MT. Commercial and municipal fishery went down by 19.36% and 7.39%, respectively. The slump in figures owed to less fishing efforts due to high cost of fuel and rough seas, and change of preference of fisher folks to gather elvers in coastal areas rather than deep sea fishing for higher income/profit.

On the other hand, the services sector reflected an upswing especially on telecommunications (established new cell sites and created new channels) and transportation (increased in number of vehicles registered) subsectors.

In support to the financial requirements of the sectors, capital assistance were provided by the major financial institutions in the region such as the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) and the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP). LBP outstanding loans for North Luzon increased by 21.52% while DBP outstanding loans increased by 10.06%.

Under the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI)’s Business Name Registration (BNR), the number of firms registered grew at a total of 10, 605 firms. Most of these came from Isabela accounting for 39.14%.The increase in number of firms increased by 27.9% totaling to P3.127B worth of investments.

The activities across the sectors brought positive gains to the people in the form of employment absorption. The total labor force in the region is 66.9% and 97.3% or 1.457 M is employed. While a drop in employment compared to CY 2011 average was registered (lower than 0.54%), those employed are in better situation in CY 2012 with underemployment at only 184,000 from 221,000.

On the average, inflation was pegged at 2.16%. With more quantity of agricultural commodities produced, the inflation rate of food was only 1.48% while the lower fishery catch increased the fish index by 6.89%. Electricity, Gas and other Fuels moved up by 4.44% due to high prices of petroleum products. The consumer index along alcoholic beverage and tobacco marked index inflation at 4.51% and 5.38%, respectively, this being pulled by the Sin Tax Bill.