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Benguet veggie farmers losing opportunities to train in China

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – Farmers in this vegetable-producing province have lost several opportunities to train in China on how to produce quality agricultural crops without heavily using chemicals and pesticides in the production process because of minor differences.

This was bared by Dr. Charles Cheng, one of the leaders of the Filipino-Chinese Community in Baguio City and Benguet, who added the refusal of farmers to pay their air fare to China has bungled their opportunity to be trained on organic agricultural production.

However, he said the local Chinese community is still willing to help farmers train in China on how to produce big and quality agricultural crops which are globally competitive in order for them to earn a descent income for their families.

In the 1990s, some farmers in the province were invited to train in China and were required to pay their fare from the Philippines to China and vice versa while the sponsors will take care of everything but those chosen wanted the trip to be all expenses paid by the sponsors which resulted in the project being called off.

Cheng said local farmers must learn to minimize the use of chemicals and pesticides in the production of their crops because the health of their consumers and their families are the ones being compromised.

He called on local farmers to learn how to sacrifice a little so that they will be equipped with the proper knowledge and skills especially from the Chinese farmers on how to produce quality crops with lesser farm inputs.

Dennis Sy, president of the Baguio Filipino-Chinese Chamber of Commerce, said that one of the major setbacks in the local agriculture industry is the blatant failure of farmers to comply with their commitments especially for contract growers.

According to him, farmers tend to sell their products to other buyers especially when the market price is much higher than the buying price of their benefactors, thus, food chains and high-end consumers have lost their trust and confidence to the local farmers.

At the same time, Sy cited that the lack of crop programming is a major deterrent in the stability of prices of local agricultural crops since there is an over supply of vegetables particularly when the buying price is high, thus, the law of supply and demand will prevail thereby affecting the income of farmers.

The local businessman recommended that local farmers must form a strong cooperative so they will have the bargaining power to deal with contract growers and high-end consumers for a better price of their products and not to be cheated by middlemen especially when the transaction is done on individual basis where the farmer is always at the losing end.