MORE than 2,000 farmers in Dalaguete will benefit from the P500,000 worth of composting facilities from the Department of Agriculture (DA) that were turned over by Sen. Cynthia Villar during the town’s “Utanon Festival” last week.
Mayor Ronald Cesante and the local agriculture officer received from Villar a rotary composter, which will transform 1,000 kilos of market wastes from plant and animal residue into 800 kilos of fertilizer in five days.
Villar also turned over a shredding machine and a compost tea brewer.
A shredding machine reduces to small pieces wastes like leaves, branches and twigs, while the tea brewer converts compost soil into liquid fertilizer, which is ideal for spraying.
“Why buy fertilizers when we can produce?” said Villar, in her speech during the program of the Utanon Festival dance showdown.
Part of Villar’s advocacy is the Social Institute for Poverty Alleviation and Governance (Sipag), which conducts training on different livelihood projects designed to protect the environment and promote the use of indigeous materials.
Before the festival, a ceremonial turnover of the equipment was held in the town’s composting center in Sitio Cansusi, Barangay Tapon, five kilometers from the town proper.
Municipal Agriculture and Natural Resources Officer Expedezitas Lenaris said that the organic fertilizer produced by the composting equipment will lessen the farmers’ expenses for fertilizer by 30 percent.
Dalaguete has 1,200 farmers who are members of 21 accredited organizations and more than 800 farmers who do not belong to any group.
Upon receiving Mayor Cesante’s letter-request, Villar, head of the Senate committee on agriculture and food, immediately responded by allocating a portion of her discretionary funds through the DA.
Villar said she plans to donate more rotary composters to other local government units that are agriculture producers.
The town’s composting center produces vermi cast, an organic fertilizer soil produced by earthworms, in their 15 vermi beds.
Fertilizer soil is sold at a lower price to farmers’ organizations.
Lenaris said they give African night crawler earthworms to the organization who wants to replicate their production of vermi cast.
Villar suggested using a mechanized sieve that will separate earthworms from vermi cast soil, instead of the manual separation, which is laborious and time consuming.
She also urged Cesante to seek help from government agencies in their income-generating projects.
“Hindi na sila kailangan ng (financial) investment sa agrikultura, mag-organize sila ng farmers’ cooperative and avail themselves of the services and grants from the government. Maraming pera ang gobyerno para sa ganito (The government has a lot of funds for programs like this),” she added.