Oasis Of Panay! Passi City, Iloilo Chosen As Satellite Nursery Site

This story proves once again that “God works in mysterious ways” and “Everything happens for a reason.”
What started simply as a trip to Passi City, Iloilo to watch two of our boxers from North Cotabato participate in Sen. Manny Pacquiao’s Blow by Blow Boxing Show could yet start the historic Greening of Panay Island with selected varieties of fruit trees with a ready market.
Both our boxers lost but the story of their defeat will now be just a sidebar to a bigger event which developed during my short trip to the province where my ancestors came from.
During the boxing event sponsored by the City of Passi, I met the young mayor of Passi City who impressed me as a pro-active and open-minded leader who embraces new ideas.
During the event, I told Mayor Stephen Palmares, a lawyer who belongs to the established Palmares political family of Iloilo, that I brought with me hundreds of seedlings of Hass Avocado, Durian, EVIARC Sweet Jackfruit and Cempedak because several farmers from Panay had long asked me to share with them planting materials from my nursery.
I also told him that because of the huge demand from farmers in Iloilo and Panay Island for more planting materials, I was looking for an area where I could establish a satellite nursery for several fruit tree varieties.
Mayor Palmares immediately offered his city as the location of the proposed Braveheart Farms Satellite Nursery.
So, upon arriving home in Kidapawan City last weekend, I crafted a program which would go beyond just the establishment of a Satellite Nursery but also start what I would call the Panay Island Greening Program.
The Panay Island Greening Program would be an innovation from the usual Tree Planting Program as this would introduce the planting of fruit tree seedlings with a ready market like Hass Avocado, EVIARC Sweet Jackfruit and Durian.
With a land area of 1.2-million hectares, Panay Island could easily target 1-million fruit trees whose produce could be exported or served to the growing tourism industry in. the island.
In addition to these fruit tree varieties, we will also be introducing other exotic fruit tree varieties like Cempedak, Mangosteen and Longkong Lanzones.
The key to the success of this program would be the marketing agreement which will be forged between farmers who will join the program and established fruit exporters like the Eng Seng Company of Davao City which is currently the No. 1 exporter of Durian to China and companies like Unifrutti which is looking for partners in the production of Hass Avocado.
When implemented, this would not only turn Passi City into a virtual Oasis of Panay Island but also provide additional sources of income for our nursery operators in North Cotabato and jobs for our people as well.
All of this happened not because we planned it but because “God works in mysterious ways” and “Everything happens for a reason.”
#GodWorksInMysteriousWays!