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Lowell - an argriculturist in Philippines

A family farmer-turned-government expert uses drone to help farmers who lost their crops in disasters in Philippines

Country Philippines

Duration 11m6s

Edit Version Clean

Video Type B Roll Video

Date 09/10/2018

File size 1.68 GB

Unique ID UF2T2V

All editorial uses permitted

Production details and shotlist

UNFAO Source FAO Video

Shotlist SHOTLIST

1. Drone flying

2. Hands on a drone remote control

3. Close up on the face of Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist from the Department of Agriculture of Philippines

4. Lowell Rebillaco piloting a drone

5. Lowell Rebillaco holding a drone

6. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "When I was a child I dreamed of helping not just my family but, our neighbours, who are also farmers."

7. Plow pulled by an ox

8. Various of farmers planting rice

9. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "Farming is common here in the Philippines. So I came from a family of farmers, we cultivate the land, we plant rice and taking care of it applied the necessary management practices and harvest it. I don't have the exact data, but most of the population rely on agriculture, maybe from 60 to 70 per cent heavily rely on farming".

10. Farmers harvesting rice

11. Tractor driven in the fields

12. Woman carrying a baby girl in her harms

13. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "The Philippines has almost 20 typhoons every year, so our farmers experience losses from calamities. Particularly from typhoons and flooding. We know that every typhoon or flooding can destroy our crops. And there are times when they will harvest the next week and then a calamity arrives today and then all of the fields are flooded".

14. Screen showing satellite images of a typhoon

15. Clouds in the sky

16. Aerial footage of fields

17. Aerial footage of damaged crops

18. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "Now that I am in the Department of Agriculture, I have the opportunity to help our farmers. Opportunity to help them in how to improve their productivity, on how to recover from calamities. When a calamity arrives we make a call, or send a text message to our counterparts in the local government units to submit their report to us."

19. Various of Lowell Rebillaco walking to his office

20. Various of Lowell Rebillaco at work in his office

21. Lowell Rebillaco getting off from a car

22. Lowell Rebillaco walking

23. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "When there is a calamity and then I prepare the damage assessment report. So I prepare (a report) on how many areas are affected, what are the crops affected, is it only rice, vegetables even livestock and poultry. So we prepare all that and we timely submit it to the central office for immediate funding. So when we have the reports, we do our validations in the field, three days after the calamity arrives. So three days, we go back to the field, we inspect, we validate the field, we validate if the rice fields are already damaged, but just ocular, and we do just an estimation of the area. However before we didn't have scientific basis to estimate the extension of the area."

24. Various of Lowell Rebillaco assessing a damaged field.

25. People carrying a box

26. Man lifting an antenna

27. Lowell Rebillaco checking the radio

28. People talking

29. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "When there is a calamity we usually collaboratively work with Food and Agriculture Organization. The FAO will visit us, or request a copy of the damage report. On our part, when we hear FAO, we say 'oh, awsome! That people are experts, we want that.' We feel so excited that the FAO will train us in using drones and other applications like GIS."

30. Hands mounting a propeller

31. Hands installing a battery

32. Person screwing a screw on a drone

33. Close up on screwdriver turning

34. Man installing an antenna

35. Man holding a drone

36. Lowell Rebillaco talking and smiling

37. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "When I fly a drone, I feel a little bit nervous, because I don't want the drone to be dropped."

38. Various of Lowell Rebillaco launching a drone with the help of a trainer

39. Done pilot passes the remote control to Lowell Rebillaco

40. Drone flying

41. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "Of course you are the one that operate it, so when you view the images and the video, you think I am the one that captured it from the above, from a bird side. I am just like a pilot, like Superman flying from above."

42. Drone flying

43. Lowell Rebillaco looking at a drone flying

44. Hands on drone remote control

45. Drone flying

46. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "The drone will fly from here to there and it will capture images and video, the drone speaks for himself, the image captured by drone speak for itself. We don't need to walk a little bit longer."

47. Various aerial pictures of damaged fields

48. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "When you see, or when you view, the images and the video captured is very awesome. Like the green fields, or the fields that are submerged by the water, the fields that are damaged, and you can see in the video that this is the extension of damaged or heavily damaged (areas) by flood water. So we showed on a screen to our directors and supervisors the drone validations and somehow they were satisfied that these farmers that own the damaged fields will receive assistance from us in the form of seeds, fertilizer and other things that could help them to start all over again. This drone programme changed our work because it lessen our time in validation. It lessen our time in conducting validation and second it produces real time and accurate information because it also has GPS points and we can trace where are the fields that are affected. We can track it in the GIS. So our supervisors will immediately see that these fields are now affected."

49. Various of drone taking off for damaged fields assessment

50. Aerial footage from a drone

51. Lowell Rebillaco catching a landing drone

52. Lowell Rebillaco putting a drone in the back of a van

53. SOUNDBITE (English), Lowell Rebillaco, Agriculturist, Department of Agriculture, Philippines saying: "Let's keep helping each other so that food will be available not just in the Philippines, but also in the whole world".

Ends

Script STORYLINE

Lowell Rebillaco grew up on a family farm in the Philippines. “When I was a child I dreamed of helping not just my family but, our neighbours, who are also farmers,” Rebillaco says.

Today Rebillaco is a Department of Agriculture employee, he works on calamities' damages assessment in order to help farmers who lost their crops.

Rebillaco explains "the Philippines has almost 20 typhoons every year, so our farmers experience losses from calamities. Particularly from typhoons and flooding. We know that every typhoon or flooding can destroy our crops. And there are times when they will harvest the next week and then a calamity arrives today and then all of the fields are flooded".

Usually the assessment of the damages to refund and help the farmers to start all over again was done by walking through the fields with no scientific support, but thanks to a joint FAO-Department of Agriculture project drones are used to develop reports on crop size and health and speed up the process of determining the extent of damage to farmers’ crops in the event of natural disasters.

"Before we didn't have scientific basis to estimate the extension of the area" says Rebillaco that is involved in the programme.

Now the use of drones has improved the quality of Rebillaco work: "when you view the images and the video captured is very awesome. Like the green fields, or the fields that are submerged by the water, the fields that are damaged, and you can see in the video that this is the extension of damaged or heavily damaged (areas) by flood water."

Also the speed of his work has tangibly increased "this drone programme changed our work because it lessen our time in conducting validation and it produces real time and accurate information because it also has GPS points and we can trace where are the fields that are affected."

Fixed-wing drones can cover up to 200 hectares in just thirty minutes, while one person can survey roughly seven hectares a day. The still images are processed and stitched together to form one image. The drones capture both RBG and near-infrared images and these two images can generate the vegetation index, which shows the vegetation health of crops and pest infestation levels. Quadcopters also support near real-time assessments, so experts can make even quicker decisions.

The images can be used to address a variety of conditions, including flooding and pest infestation and, in some cases, to lessen the impact of such threats by timing harvests appropriately.
By working with governments to share technology and knowledge, FAO is empowering them to take action and be a part of the global goal to achieve Zero Hunger.

Ends