LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – Farmers in Benguet are fast transitioning to production management towards increased micro-autonomy by individuals, cooperatives or farmer organizations.
And these new technologies, technically termed by agricultural savants as “Root-crop, Fruit-Based Processing Technologies” are giving an edge to these adopters an edge in increased farm profitability, as compared to those refusing to learn of the new trends.
Technological and political will are helping farmers in Benguet and elsewhere in Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) to transition the environmental footprint into food systems away from waste.
By political will, CAR Local Government Units (LGUs) have often been seen regularly sending in their representatives to farmers’ meetings/seminars/trainings who in turn exhort these farmers to accept technological innovations that redounds to their future economic well-being.
Tons of fruit and vegetables are produced annually in CAR, sufficient even to supply domestic demands of other regions. Yet, many of these products are lost or wasted in the supply chain post or simply food loss due to non-utilization.
Take for example the “Prospective Urban/Rural Epidemiology Study,” which calculates that the mean consumption of fruits and vegetables of servings daily in low income and lower income countries worldwide do not meet the dietary recommendations for fruits and vegetables.
Hence, with the increasing challenges being posed by climate change, technological and political innovations must be applied to efficiencies in the entire fruit and vegetable chains, the study stresses.
Some of the Local Government Units (LGUs) who continue to make their political presence felt in CAR’s agriculture sector are some members of La Trinidad, Benguet Sangguniang Bayan. More often than not, La Trinidad mayor Romeo Salda would be seen in leading in the forefront in addressing agricultural issues, together with other concerned agencies.
Next is the entire LGU officialdom of Buguias, Benguet. Buguias mayor Ruben Tinda-an, has long been exploring solutions to the overproduction of vegetables that continuously plague Buguias farmers
Another is the LGU of Tabuk, Kalinga. Led by Mayor Darwin Estranero, the mayor has underscored and proven that agriculture and tourism combined can maximize potentials of these two economic drivers for the benefit of Kalinga.
And other LGUs are following in the footsteps of Salda, Tinda-an and Estranero. With the help of “Root-crop, Fruit-Based Processing Technologies.”
The project intervention of BSU in CAR can be found in, “Adoption of Root crop and Fruit-based Processing Technologies Learned from Training Programs,” and conducted by BSU researchers Esther T. Botangen, Hilda L. Quindara and Joyce K. Mama-o, it showed how respondents gained success in their endeavors through newly-acquired agricultural tweaks.
Propelling force behind this technology shift is Benguet State University (BSU) through its arm, the Northern Philippine Root-crops Research and Training Center (BSU-NPRCRTC). Since it launched its program of processing technology, more than 487 individuals and four farmer associations reaped the benefit of the trainings.
BSU-NPRCRTC continues to share these processing technologies to individual household members, farmers, associations, voluntary organizations in collaboration with line agencies in CAR and even in Region- 01, which makes R-01 fortunate.
Also, fortunate to have gained the technologies were 33 adopters from Ilocos Region, Benguet and Mountain Province, four associations with a total of 13 members and 20 individual respondents.
These associations included the Sugpon Food Processors Association, Green Thumb 4-H Club, Samantha’s Livelihood and Taynan’s Livelihood – all from the Ilocos Region.
In fact, many of those CAR and R-01 individuals who have acquired the technologies aver that the government-run Technology and Livelihood Resource Center (TLRC) which serves the public through acquisition and promotion of technology was not even able to teach them about said technologies acquired through BSU-NPRCRTC.
One of them, Sebio Ampasil, who resides at Longlong Barangay, La Trinidad, explained that many times he tried to avail of the services of TLRC by surfing the Internet but came up blank. When he tried BSU-NPRCRTC, he hit the jackpot.
Along the stretches of the main road of Longlong barangay, can easily be seen products of these trained individuals, like fruits turned to wine and other beverages. Visitors always drop by to buy these products as “pasalubong.”
Aside from the beverages are root-crop based snack items, desserts, breads, cookies or flour made from cassava. These trained individuals have shown that the BSU-NPRCRTC innovations are capable of making ube into wine, instant ginger tea, instant turmeric tea and potato chips, making these activities into viable enterprises.
Of the many trained farmers, their households adopted technologies on “ube halaya,” sweet potato or kamote juice, puto, maja, camarind, cassava flour, starch, pitchi-pitchi, kutchinta and bibingka.
One farmer association in CAR was able to raise the bar higher by tweaking just a little bit of the drying process in potato chip production. The result was an improved blot drying process which increased their production efficiency in potato chips.
Production of ube wine generated the highest returns over cash expenses at 37.82%, followed by instant turmeric, 28.08% and ginger tea at 34.08%.
Processing technologies shared by BSU to respondents were 39 in all, capable of turning root-crop and fruit-based agricultural products into delectable innovations.
By site breakdown, Kapangan, Abra and Kalinga decided on full-blown cassava processing and utilization, Mountain Province concentrated on potato processing, ginger tea concentrate and banana processing. Ilocos Region participants decided to utilize their main crops, ube and ginger.
One of the CAR participants, Kaila Cardonez from Benguet, said of her experience on food processing: “It was worth the trouble. With the technologies I learned, I can already provide for my family and not think of becoming an OFW and leave my children.”
Another, Antonia Percival, also from CAR explained that the technologies she received has alleviated their family’s domestic expense: “With my husband as partner, we deliver our products to Madaymen, Kibungan, other parts in Benguet and sometimes, as far as Cervantes Municipality.”
Such profuse gratitude coming from the trainees is a feather in the cap for BSU it has imparted as a livelihood and a guarantee that such technologies can cover years of years of operation.
Tropical root crops are staple food for many of the very poor in the developing world. They are also relatively an unfamiliar and underutilized source of both animal feed and energy. BSU’s efforts towards making these crops important is a contribution towards rural development.
On the other hand, the contribution of fruit-based processing technology is widely recognized by merely understanding that the thousand kilos of fruits displayed at different CAR public markets daily could hardly be bought by the consuming public. Any left on the stalls starts to deteriorate and go to waste and eventually economic loss, explained the BSU researchers.
Waste generation is one of the biggest environmental problems faced by hawkers of fruits. Fruit and vegetable category accounts for the main waste generated during a food supply chain and the discarded material needs to be moved out from a public market site immediately due to the rotting smell it generates.
The fruit-based processing technologies introduced are ideal solutions that are flexible, personalized and efficient in resource utilization and based on seasonality and demand. A common main goal of the technologies was attaining high quality food products that meet consumer demand for freshness and convenience without compromising the safe microbiological standards for consumption.
These fruit-based technologies also highlight the importance of involving all intervenient aspects of the food supply chain to mitigate the environmental impact by applying more sustainable and environmentally sustainable solutions, the researchers explained.
Aligned with the current consumer demand to provide safer and minimally processed foods with high quality attributes, BSU-NPRCRTC has been encouraged to find efficient and innovative processing technologies to maintain the nutritional and sensory qualities at the same time, providing food microbiological and shell-life stability.
Based on the review of why the products of these trained people were being accepted by the buying public, considerable evidence shows the price-benefit issue is the main determinant for acceptance and purchase of their products.
Meaning, they were able to feature the health benefits of their products on consumer’s perception of the impact of health-related consumer perceived values in today’s time when consumers are more health-conscious. While unit price is reasonable.
