DAVAO CITY—The Department of Agriculture (DA) has set aside P52.02 million to boost cacao production in the Davao region to help the Philippines meet foreign and local demand for the produce.
The amount would cover production support, market development, extension support, education and training, irrigation and machinery, equipment and facilities.
The DA said some P28 million would go to production support
which could entail the purchase of planting materials and establishing
or rehabilitating nurseries and budwood gardens.
For this year, the DA bought 700,000 cacao-planting materials, which will be distributed for free to farmers. Half of all existing cacao trees in the region, according to the DA’s High Value Crops Program chief Melani Provido, need rehabilitation through pruning and ground cleaning.
Next year the DA would buy 1 million planting materials, as it embarks on its goal to expand farmlands planted with cacao to 20,000 hectares in three years.
The DA would also spend P1.5 million to conduct market studies and research, benchmarking value chain and other market-support services.
Its extension-program support this year would get P5.05 million and would compose of trainings and farm-demonstration activities.
The research and development services would focus on production and postharvest.
The DA has allocated P1.22 million in irrigation support, and would mostly involve small ventures, such as constructing shallow-tube wells, small farm reservoir and small water-impounding dams, tapping natural springs and, wherever possible, develop irrigation using solar, ram pump and windmill power.
The next bigger allocation, or P16.25 million, would be used to purchase harvest machinery, equipment and facilities.
The government is targeting to buy processing equipment, such as cacao grinders, roaster and tablea-maker; postharvest equipment, such as fermentation tanks and coffee and cacao dryers; and processing facilities, such as for cacao tablea.
The Davao region’s output of
dried cacao beans jumped to 1,200 metric tons (MT) in 2009, from 170 MT in 2008.
Last year it increased to 4,600 MT. The region accounts for 80 percent of total national production.
Davao del Sur is the highest producer, at 1,718 MT, followed by this city, with1,129 MT.