Green Philippines! Western Visayas, Mindoro Swing Starts 25-ha. Giant Bamboo Farm

In a 7-day sortie covering the Western Visayas and Mindoro Island, my personal advocacy to contribute to the greening of the country has literally taken roots with 5,000 Giant Bamboo large planting materials distributed in 8 provinces.

The 5,000 Dendrocalamus asper planting materials could cover 25-hectares of Giant Bamboo nursery which in 3 to 4 years could be the source of propagules for expansion programs.

Processed Giant Bamboo is now accepted in the U.S. as housing and building materials with a small processing facility in Malaybalay, Bukidnon already exporting treated Bamboo slats to Vietnam and the U.S.

Negros Occidental Gov. Bong Lacson personally received his province’s share of the Giant Bamboo planting materials and said that the program fits his own Greening Negros Advocacy.

Iloilo Governor Arthur Defensor, Jr. said that the Giant Bamboo planting materials could boost their local bamboo industry which had been focused mainly on “amakan” and furniture making, including the production of chopstick and toothpicks.

Along with the Giant Bamboo planting materials, I also distributed 500 seedlings of the EVIARC Sweet Jackfruit, also known as the Abuyog Sweet, to the different provinces to serve as Mother Trees.

The Green Philippines Advocacy which I am personally undertaking is a tweak or improvisation of the National Greening Program of the government which focuses on merely reforestation and environmental protection with little emphasis on economic returns.

When I moved from the Department of Agriculture to the Mindanao Development Authority in 2019, I conceptualized a program called Green Mindanao Project which promoted the planting of high-value fruit trees and bamboo in the denuded highlands of Mindanao, including areas which are prone to soil erosion.

The program emphasized economic returns for those who plant Bamboo and high-value fruit trees to encourage them to participate in the Green Mindanao Project.

High-value fruit trees like Hass Avocado, Abuyog Sweet Jackfruit, Mangosteen and Coffee, along with other species were introduced as part of the Greening Mindanao Program.

Giant Bamboo was also introduced in the upstream of the 9 major river basins of Mindanao to address soil erosion while at the same time creating a Bamboo processing industry.

The Green Philippines Advocacy hopes to cover the entire country with at least 500 Giant Bamboo planting materials and 100 Jackfruit Seedlings to serve as Mother Trees.

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#GoodMountainGoodWaterGoodLife!