A senior Philippine Church official said the challenges facing the country’s rural communities are not merely economic but moral and urged stronger support for family farm schools as climate change, poverty, and migration place growing pressure on farmers and their families.
Bishop Gerardo Alminaza of San Carlos, president of Caritas Philippines, made the appeal in a video message to a forum of the Pilipinas Association of Rural Families for Education and Development (PARFED).
The Pilipinas Association of Rural Families for Education and Development is the national federation of Family Farm Schools in the Philippines. It promotes an educational model that integrates classroom instruction, practical farm work, entrepreneurship, and community life, helping prepare rural youth and farming families for sustainable agriculture and community development.
“These are not only economic concerns. They are moral concerns. They challenge us to ask what kind of society we are building and whose future we are protecting,” Alminaza said.
The prelate said the Church must help create conditions that allow rural families to remain on their land and see a future in agriculture rather than simply respond when communities are already in crisis.
“Our mission is not only to respond when people are already in need. We must also help create conditions where families can remain on their land with dignity, where young people can see hope in agriculture, and where communities can shape their own future,” he said.
Alminaza praised PARFED for sustaining the Family Farm School model, saying it forms young people who remain connected to their communities while preparing them for productive work.
“You have shown that education is not only about preparing young people for employment. It is about forming persons who know their roots, love their communities, and recognize that the land entrusted to them is both a gift and a responsibility,” he said.
Alminaza added that the model teaches young people “that agriculture is not simply a means of survival but a vocation that serves the common good.”
“Those who cultivate the land also help nourish our nation,” he said.
The bishop said rural communities continue to face mounting challenges as climate change makes farming increasingly unpredictable and economic pressures force many families to leave the countryside.
“Climate change has made farming more uncertain. Many families struggle to earn a decent living. Many young people leave their hometowns because they no longer see a future in agriculture,” he said.
Quoting Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si’, Alminaza said environmental degradation and rural poverty cannot be separated.
“Farmers understand this reality perhaps more deeply than anyone else. When the land suffers, families suffer. When forests disappear, when water becomes scarce, when harvests fail, entire communities carry the burden,” he said.
