The new administration under President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo provides the highest priority to food security and poverty alleviation. RA 8435 otherwise known as the Agriculture and Fisheries Modernization Act of 1997 aims at strengthening the support services for modernizing agriculture and fisheries at the same time empower people particularly the smallholders engage in sustainable agricultural development. A previous legislation-Republic Act 7900 or High Value Crops Development Act promotes the development of high value crops and provides the market orientation of developing the industry. The Department of Agriculture (DA), as the lead institution, presents a national development program Ginintuang Masaganang Ani (GMA) , as the banner program to carry out the functions and mandate under the AFMA towards meeting the goal set by the Arroyo administration.

The Ginintuang Masaganang Ani (GMA) -High Value Crops Program provides the national directions and framework for harmonizing local initiatives. High value crops offer alternative profitable opportunities to smallholders and lend well to value adding activities and marketing agreements or joint ventures with users or processors. The market orientation of high value crops production systems is imperative in a free market economy and within the full implementation of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) where large corporations will have to explore new management, production and marketing approaches to sustain their business operations. Structural adjustments need to be made to involve smallholders, Policy reforms have been defined with some in full implementation providing clear signals to the private sector as basis for making medium and long term investment decisions.

The Ginintuang Masaganang Ani (GMA) High Value Crops Program replaces the Gintong Ani - High Value Commercial crops Program (GA-H VCCP). The new program adopts a major shift towards market-oriented production systems by introducing the Commodity Producers Linkages with Users (Commodity-PLUS) as the basic reference for addressing the gaps in the commodity marketing systems. To cushion the impact of the currency crisis, the Program will encourage the production of selected commodities which are largely imported, e.g., mung bean and peanut, to conserve foreign exchange, and expand exports to generate additional foreign exchange.

The new program will adopt the same policy and strategic framework, particularly the orientation of production systems to market opportunities or buyers specifications. The need to orient production systems to markets is imperative and inevitable as:

• The high value crops industry must be Competitive in a free market;
• There is renewed confidence by processors to make long-term investments since government policies are more responsive to private sector needs, such as the removal of Import restrictions and reduction of tariffs on agriculture inputs to zero to enhance the industry's competitiveness;
• The full implementation of the CARP covering the large plantations has provided affected corporations opportunities to explore new production, marketing, and management modalities with smallholders; and
• The AFMA provides for strengthening and redirecting the government bureaucracy toward & market orientation coupled with improved production resources.