By Manny Piñol
Two months ago, I planted 12 Abaca suckers in my farm in Kidapawan City as part of my own experiment on what variety would perform well under the conditions in my home province of North Cotabato.
The planting materials were brought to my farm by Phil. Fiber Development Authority Director Neoven Hibaler.
The planting materials consisted of three varieties – Maguindanao which endemic in Maguindanao area, Tangonan which was sourced from the Davao area and the Kutay-kutay of Sulu.
I have been promoting the planting of Abaca because of the great demand in the market today.
Used as material in making security papers, paper money, ropes, insulators, handicraft items, Abaca is a native Philippine plant which could earn farmers as much as P140,000 per hectare even when planted only as a second crop to coconuts.
Last Saturday, I checked on the three Abaca suckers I planted and I was impressed by the performance of Sulu’s Kutay-kutay.
Compared to the two other varieties, Kutay-kutay had between four to seven shooters after only two months.
The Maguindanao variety, on the other hand, only had one shooter while the Tangonan had not grown any yet.
Why am I relating this seemingly inconsequential story of how several varieties of Abaca performed in field trials?
I am doing this to emphasise the importance of conducting field trials to guide farmers on what variety to plant.
For so many times in the past, farmers were just left on their own in doing their own field trials which proved to be expensive and time consuming experiments.
The performance and productivity of plants depend on the type of soil and climatic conditions of a specific area.
With the simple act of planting three varieties of Abaca in the Kidapawan area, I would be able to guide farmers who would like to get into Abaca farming.
This alone will save them time, efforts and money.
(First photo shows me planting the Abaca two months ago. Here is how they look now with the first four photos showing the Kutay-kutay variety and the last photo showing the Maguindanao variety.)
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