THROUGH the Serbisyong Totoo Rubber Development Program, the province of North Cotabato is poised to reclaim the title as rubber capital of the country with the introduction of new technology to the farmers which guarantees a higher yield and early maturity.
During the Ceremonial Rubber Tapping of Budded Rubber distributed under the program in Gonzales Farm, Makilala, North Cotabato, Governor Emmylou "Lala" Taliño-Mendoza said that the program, which include distribution of seedlings for free, was conceived years ago which seeks to alleviate the farmers from poverty and boosts the rubber industry of the province to be the country’s top producer of the crop.
In the Gonzales farm owned by Myrna Gonzales and his son where the ceremonial tapping was held, they received a total of 1,800 seedlings in their 2,000 hectares land from the provincial government last 2014. After five years of cultivation, they were able to have a rubber tapping which is the process of harvesting latex from the bark of the tree.
Governor Taliño-Mendoza has partnered with the Platinum Rubber Development Incorporated (PRDI) to provide the “big bags” technology to the farmers. The company has practical expertise on rubber propagation and processing which they shared to the farmers. They have a rubber nursery located in New Cebu, Makilala, Cotabato.
She has been encouraging the farmers who are into traditional and still using “small bags” to shift to “big bags” because the latter has only 10 percent mortality rate as compared to the old technology which has 50 percent survival plus the quality is not good.
Jack Alfonso Sandique, president of PRDI, shared their knowledge of the new technology which is embedded in North Cotabato to the farmers to help revive the ailing rubber industry of the province. With the growing interest of the farmers on this industry, he believed the province will soon register as the top rubber producer across the country.
“Today it is already a full blown technology that is spread all over the Cotabato. As we have heard Engineer Arances a while ago, almost 3,000 as of today has been planted in North Cotabato. Very soon we are going to claim back the title of the rubber capital of the Philippines, [it] will go back to North Cotabato,” he said.
Engineer Agustino Arances, the provincial rubber coordinator bared that based on their record since the program took off in 2012 until 2018, there has been a total of P60 million worth of seedlings that they distributed to the farmers.
But for the “big bag” seedlings, about 1,000 farmers have benefited from it with over 1,000 hectares of rubber plantations. Overall, 460,500 pieces of “big bags” rubber seedlings has been given while the small bags released has reached almost one million piece.