LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – Efforts are now being taken by the local government and concerned government agencies to help preserve and sustain the town’s lucrative strawberry industry where one of the desired interventions is the bringing of the Korean technology that will augment current production strategies.
Mayor Romeo K. Salda vehemently belied earlier reports that Koreans will takeover the strawberry production area within the property of the Benguet State University (BSU) that caused an outrage among the farmers as it will cause their displacement, saying that there was actually mis-communication among those who were involved in the discussions.
“We will not allow the displacement of our strawberry farmers from their established source of livelihood. What is important is that our sister municipality in Korea will be bringing in the Korean technology in strawberry production that will serve as a new one to augment our old technologies that will help in improving the production of strawberries for our residents and visitors,” Mayor Salda stressed.
The local chief executive claimed that the earlier proposal was for the Koreans to use some two hectares of the existing strawberry farm or whatever available production area to showcase their strawberry production technology and subsequently turnover to the farmers the same after five years for the local farmers to have an added production technology.
“We understand the outrage of our strawberry farmers but we were able to explain to the real proposal. We will again present to them the proposal of our Korean sister city to help bring in a new production technology in strawberry production for their own benefit,” he added.
The mayor pointed out that there is still sufficient supply of strawberries even if there was a reported drop in production from 18 kilos to 15 kilos per hectare because there are other strawberry farmers in other municipalities that are also producing the fruit for the various markets inside and outside the locality.
According to him, the Chuga and Sweet Charlie varieties are already old ones that is why the runners that are being produced are also affected since the said Japanese technology had been introduced in the municipality way back in the 1980s when he was still the manager of a local strawberry producer that already warrants the introduction of new technologies suitable to the prevailing situation.
At present, more than 1,200 farmers rely on strawberry production as their major source of income aside from other strawberry producers in other municipalities like Madaymen, Kibungan; Atok; Itogon; Bauko, Mountain Province; Tuba among others.
Salda admitted that it is the Snow-White variety that is currently experiencing shortage in the volume of runners but there are also complementary efforts that are being done to ensure sufficient supply in preparation for the upcoming planting season by August or September this year.
Earlier, some Koreans paid a courtesy call to ranking BSU officials and offered to facilitate the transfer of the Korean technology in strawberry production that resulted in a mis-communication among concerned sectors.
The said mis-communication eventually resulted in an outrage among strawberry farmers as they strongly opposed the purported proposal to takeover the existing strawberry production area that will deprive the concerned stakeholders of their source of livelihood which was not actually the case as earlier explained by the mayor.
Concerned sectors welcomed the decision of the local government to partner with its sister municipality in Korea to bring in the necessary technology that will improve the strawberry production on the municipality so that farmers will be able to sustain their established sources of income for their respective families.
Strawberry farmers are now busy producing runners in time for the upcoming planting season by August or September to ensure the sufficient supply of the fruit during its peak season every December to March.
La Trinidad was able to enter the Guinness Book of world Records when it was able to prepare and serve to the public the Largest Strawberry Shortcake in 2004. Since then, the town’s Strawberry festival had become one of the preferred crowd drawing events frequented by foreign and domestic tourists annually because of the innovations that are being introduced to showcase the strawberry fruit. By Dexter A. See