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Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Science pushes cheap organic fertilizer to boost exports
TABUK, Kalinga -- Being told to go organic, farmers here are being lured by the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) to shift to low-cost sources of organic fertilizer and means to produce feeds.
They said going back to the adoption of village technology on fertilizer and feed production generic among rural folks is still one of the cheapest strategies to increase agriculture production and boost exports.
According to experts in the DOST promoting this technology transfer, an attempt to reintroduce vermiculture in the province to produce vermicompost and vermimeal is a better alternative to cut dependence of farmers on inorganic fertilizers and feeds. A similar seminar on vermiculture was conducted in March 2005 at the Tabuk Pastoral Center but no taker ever succeeded as the market is dominated by inorganic fertilizer to suit the growth of hybrid varieties on vegetable and crops raised today.
DOST provincial director Alfredo Rigonan said 20 farmers will undergo training on vermiculture in their office on July 27 to jumpstart its promotion on the long-run for its commercialization, if entrepreneurs are fully equipped to establish large-scale production. Farmers here, a dominant sector, are using inorganic fertilizer for rice and corn farming.
Vermicompost is a high-quality organic fertilizer containing up to 8 percent nitrogen, 0.7 percent phosphorous, 1 percent potash and trace elements. It can be used for replacing chemical fertilizers, or a combination of both, for vegetable and crop production.
Rigonan explained that vermicompost has many advantages drawn from one of its by-product, earthworm biomass, because the vermicomposting process is not produced in other composting systems. He said vermicompost is pure humus or organic matter in granular form and is more effective than ordinary compost as organic fertilizer proven in field tests.
Luzviminda Guerrero of the Philippine Council for Aquatic and Marine Research & Development of the DOST explained that the process of producing organic fertilizer is the use of agricultural waste through the action of the African nightcrawler kind of earthworm.
Another product that can be produce from vermiculture is vermimeal or earthworm meal, the product produced from the processing of earthworm biomass from vermicomposting. Rigonan said it is a high-protein feedstuff source for animal and fish feeds. It also has potential for human food and as a source of bioactive compounds for medical uses.
The process requires gathering of earthworms, washing and killing, drying, grinding, packing, storage and finally marketing. Vermimeal can partly or wholly replace imported fish meal used and fish feeds. It can also be used for human consumption and as a potential source of bioactive compounds for medical application.
The advantages of vermimeal, Rigonan said, ranges from the availability of raw materials to its high profitability as a business enterprise. Besides being environment-friendly, no imported input is required and processing can be mechanized. The return in investment can reach as high as 50 percent of the project cost. An investment of P7,500 could yield another P7,500 net return. According to Rigonan, a kilo of earthworms worth P800 can triple in a month.
Vermimeal is a high-protein feedstuff that compares well with imported fishmeal. It has been tested locally and has been proven effective for animal and fish nutrition. It can be locally-produced using available raw materials in most agricultural areas in the country. However, vermimeal production is new and is not being commercialized at the present, and not yet well-known to the industry. (Press release)
(July 26, 2006 issue)
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