CITY OF SAN FERNANDO -- Department of Agriculture (DA) Secretary Emmanuel Piñol is looking at turning the uncollected chicken manure in Pampanga into organic fertilizer.
This came after Piñol said that Mayor Jomar Hizon of Bacolor told him that the province will soon have a problem on what to do with the tons of chicken manure from poultry farms in the province.
Piñol said that Pampanga's poultry farms are the sources of chicken dung used to fertilize the vast vegetable farms in the Cordillera Region.
"With the restrictions on the transport of poultry products and by products, including wastes, this is now going to be a huge problem for the poultry farms. If left uncollected, it could be a health issue in the province," Piñol said.
The DA secretary had called people in the know on organic fertilizer production and is expecting a proposal in a week’s time.
"Passing by the vast area of erstwhile agricultural lands which have been covered by lahar after the Mt. Pinatubo eruption many years ago, an idea immediately entered my mind. The chicken dung could be processed into fertilizer and the lahar covered area could be transformed into a vegetable production area using the green house technology like how they do in the desert areas of Israel. Solar powered irrigation systems could be installed the area estimated to be about 5,000 hectares to provide water to the green houses. The green houses could produce high value vegetables which, using the Clark International Airport nearby, could even be exported," Piñol said.
It could be recalled that some 37,000 birds have died from avian influenza subtype H5 in what has been declared as the first bird flu outbreak in the country. The outbreak affected six poultry farms in San Luis town.
A quarantine area was declared within one-kilometer of the affected poultry farms in San Luis. Transport of fowls and eggs from a controlled area within a seven-kilometer radius of the affected farms will not be allowed.