Field of Dreams! Organic Vegetable Buyers Take Long Road to Bukidnon

Organic Vegetable Buyers

Take Long Road to Bukidnon

“Build it, they will come…”, a voice told Iowa corn farmer Ray Kinsella, played by Kevin Costner, in the 1989 movie the Field of Dreams to urge him to build the baseball field which he saw in his dreams.

I have so many Fields of Dreams in my life, areas whose vast potentials I saw in my travels to the countryside, two of which are Samar Island and the vegetable growing area of Bukidnon.

Samar, the country’s third largest island with a land area of 1.34-million hectares, was the focus of my personal and official interventions when I was Secretary of Agriculture.

The island, home to three of the poorest provinces of the country, was identified as a potential expansion area for rice production because of its fertile soil and the countless rivers as sources of irrigation water.

The SAAD Program (Special Area for Agriculture Development), a poverty alleviation strategy which I designed when I was Governor of North Cotabato and which later became a national program of the Department of Agriculture, was introduced in Samar.

Two years after it was implemented, the Philippine Statistics Authority reported great reduction in poverty levels in the whole island, a development which I failed to pursue when I resigned as DA Secretary because of my public disagreements with the policies of the Economic Managers.

The other “Field of Dreams” is the 50,000-hectare highlands in the five towns of Bukidnon – Impasugong, Malaybalay, Talakag, Sumilao and Lantapan.

I first visited the region in 2017 during the Luzon Vegetable Crisis when prices of vegetables soared 300% higher following a typhoon and immediately I saw the vast potential of the area.

In 2019, when I resigned from the DA, I continued to engage the vegetable farmers in the area in my new task as Chairman of the Mindanao Development Authority.

Last year, MinDA initiated the season-long Mindanao Vegetable Derby which involved seed companies, organic farming advocates and local farmers in an on-field demonstration and technology transfer.

Four months after the derby, the buyers are coming to my “Field of Dreams.”

Yesterday, organic farming advocate Renato “Atong” dela Cruz engaged farmer leader Ryan Danio, a Talaandig tribe, in Miarayon, Talakag for the weekly supply of 10 to 20 metric tons of assorted organic vegetables for a Luzon buyer.

Dela Cruz, a director of the National Organic Agriculture Board (NOAB), said the demand could increase as soon as the organic vegetable production receives a certification from the Control Union.

The first delivery is scheduled July but this early, preparations for the transport of the perishable high-value vegetables are already being undertaken.

A trucking company, Alba Trucking, owned by my town mate and friend, Roberto “Jun” Alba, will procure two units of 10-wheeler reefer vans for the project.

Slowly but surely, we – the farmers, local officials, MinDA, DA, private groups, non-government organizations and organic farming advocates – are seeing our Field of Dreams becoming a reality.

#KungGustoMaramingParaan!

#GovernanceIsCommonSense!

#BuildingMyFieldOfDreams!