AGRI VIEWS

Organic farming
Vency Bulayungan and Jason Cruz

LAGAWE, Ifugao - With farming as the common source of living of most families not only here but throughout the country, an Ifugao priest is encouraging farmers in the Vicariate of Bontoc-Lagawe to use the organic method of farming.

Fr. Marion Buyagawan, one of the rectors here said the Social Action for Development Center of Bonlag where he is a member, started promoting organic farming to the parishioners two years ago. It started when he was the Parish Priest in the Mission Station in Sagada, Mt. Province.

According to Fr. Marion, using organic farming is not only for the end users but also for the good of the environment. “In organic farming, there are no problems related to health and environment. The only problem encountered by the farmers is that the method is quiet laborious, which is the main cause why farmers are discouraged to do organic farming. This is the reason why we have to educate our farmers on the benefits such as safe food which depends on the method of farming being used.”

Organic farming had been practiced since time immemorial, Fr. Marion said. He explained organic farming excludes use of synthetically compounded fertilizers, pesticides, growth regulators and livestock feed additives while the inorganic way of farming uses the synthetic farm inputs such as synthetic fertilizers and pesticides which cause illness and destroy the environment.

Fr. Marion also bared he is into raising animals such as pigs and chickens the organic way. “This is unlike vegetables raised with pesticides which are harmful because the poison could not be washed away and could not be cooked, synthetic meat contains too much cholesterol which when eaten is stored in the body,” he said

Assigned here in May this year, Fr. Marion plans to promote organic farming in the barrios by conducting seminars after saying mass during Sundays. He disclosed that many parishioners here are showing interest to the said method and are requesting him to conduct sessions with the barangay folks about organic farming.
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In a related development in the national level, the Department of Agriculture is encouraging the use of at least two affordable bio-fertilizer brands that increase crop yields by as much as 20 percent, as part of a long-term strategy to wean farmers away from the use of costly, imported chemical inputs.

The microbial-based fertilizers, with the trademark names Bio-Con and Bio-N, were developed by experts at the University of the Philippines campus in Los Baños, Laguna.

Bio-N is a microbial-based inoculant that is available from suppliers in 49 newly established mixing plants nationwide, while Bio-Con is a commercially produced variety that is now being tested in the corn clusters of Mindanao, the Ilocos Region, Cagayan Valley and Central Luzon and Palawan.

DA Secretary Arthur Yap said experts from the UPLB and the Philippine Rice Research Institute (Philrice) have recommended the use of Bio-N and Biocon as affordable, growth-boosting and environment-friendly alternatives to imported chemical fertilizers after these were screened for their effectiveness on a variety of agricultural crops.

“The use of organic fertilizers will not only increase yields per hectare but will, in the long haul, actually save us hundreds of millions of pesos because this will help reduce the use of expensive, imported chemical fertilizers in palay and corn farms,” Yap said.

He noted that Bio-N, for instance, already supplies at least 50 percent of the nitrogen requirements for rice, corn and vegetables, with only five 200-gram packets needed for seeds that are enough to plant one hectare of rice or corn.

Bio-N promotes shoot growth and root development in crops, increases the yields per hectare, and develops the resistance of corn to wind and certain plant diseases.

Moreover, BIO-N inoculants are environmentally safe and can eliminate the risk of ground water pollution caused by the leaching of nitrate especially in loose soils. Biocon, on the other hand, also promotes growth, reduces the use of chemical fertilizers by 30- 50 percent with increases in yield ranging from 10 to 20 percent.

Yap noted that when Biocon was tested in rainfed rice farms in Koronadal, South Cotabato , the highest yield recorded with the use of this biofertilizer reached 6,583 kilograms compared with only 4,524 kilos without Biocon.

In Lawak, Tayug, Pangasinan, corn yields averaged 9.2 tons per hectare or two times higher with the use of Biocon and the reduction in the use of chemical fertilizers by 45%.

In Dalaguete, Cebu , tomato growers using Biocon earned additional incomes of up to P29,000 due to increased yields and a drop in the use of costly chemical inputs. For each hectare planted and fertilized with Biocon, yields increased to 44.9 tons as compared with lands that did not use Biocon, which averaged only 32.8 tons per hectare.

Biocon, Yap said, is currently being used in selected areas of the Ginintuang Masaganang Ani Corn Program in Mindanao, Central Luzon, the Ilocos Region and Cagayan Valley and approved for testing by Mayor Edward Hagedorn in Palawan . It is now under evaluation by the UPLB and Philrice for use in the GMA Rice Program.