by Lorie Ann A. Cascaro
Planting rubber trees is hitting three birds with one stone. A high potential export commodity, rubber does not only provide higher income to farmers, it also helps mitigate climate change.
With latex as the primary yield of rubber trees, 70% of rubber products are used as raw materials for tires, materials for construction of buildings and bridges, among others. The remaining 30% is used in producing gloves, artificial organs–and condoms.
The world demand increases by two to three percent every year. Malaysia with 4,334,000 hectares is the biggest producer of rubber, followed by Indonesia with 3,414,000. In the Philippines, Mindanao has the highest production of rubber with 127,215 hectares or 99.13% of total.
Marizon S. Loreto, Davao regional director of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), said rubber is a high potential export commodity.
Rubber ranks in the top two among top export products in the Davao region, following banana, based on a 2010 report of the regional Bureau of Customs. In 2009, the Philippines had a total of 128,337 hectares planted to rubber trees, producing 390,962 metric tons of rubber.
According to the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics, from 2005 to 2009, the total area planted to rubber had increased annually by 11.88%, while the production of rubber rose by 5.50%.
The top five producers of rubber in the Philippines are Zamboanga Sibugay (32.91%), North Cotabato (23.54%), Basilan (16.17%), Zamboanga del Norte (6.59%), and Zamboanga del Sur (4.58%). Although Zamboanga Sibugay has the highest number of mature rubber trees, North Cotabato has the top production with 152,154 metric tons (38.92%), followed by Zamboanga Sibugay with 122,142 metric tons (31.24%).
Comprising about 4.95% of the total area, the Davao region had rubber plantations of 6,411 hectares (ha.) in 2009, with 1,295,976 mature rubber trees. Of this area in the region, Compostela Valley has 4,373 (3.41%); Davao del Sur has 1,132 (0.88%); Davao del Norte 558 (0.43%); and, Davao City 300 (0.23%). Davao Oriental only started planting rubber in 2007 with three hectares, which expanded to 50 hectares in 2009.
In terms of the volume of production in 2009, the region produced 15,844 metric tons (mt). Compostela Valley had 11,188 mt; Davao del Sur 2,365 mt; Davao City 1,143 mt; Davao del Norte 1,090 mt; and, Davao Oriental 59 mt.
Davao Oriental DTI provincial director Ma. Belinda Q. Ambi, during the recent Kapehan sa DTI in Davao City, said rubber is one of the four major industries in the province with coconut, abaca and cacao. Considering this as potential industry, the provincial government established a village processing center in Baganga.
Encouraging farmers
Having recognized the potential of and benefits from rubber, both national and local government units and agencies promote rubber planting and nursery establishment, especially in the uplands of Mindanao.
In Compostela Valley, some government interventions were done to expand the rubber productions. With the leadership of Governor Rodolfo del Rosario, in cooperation with the Department of Agriculture and Department of Labor and Employment, farmers have been provided with technical assistance and free rubber seedlings.
New Corella, a town in Compostela Valley with five barangays covering the timberland areas, began to encourage their farmers to plant more rubber.
Mayor Nestor L. Alcoran said that a few decades ago, farmers attempted to plant rubber in their lands but failed to sustain them. Not only because they did not acquire a good variety of rubber, he said, the lack of technology and technical assistance spawned their failure.
Today, the municipality tends a rubber nursery to provide farmers with seedlings to be planted in timberland areas. Alcoran said they will monitor the volume of production to eventually put up their processing center upon steady production.
The 200 households of barangay Del Monte, a barangay in New Corella, became beneficiaries of the Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan–Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services: Kapangyarihan at Kaunlaran sa Barangay (KALAHI-CIDSS: KBB) of the Department of Social Welfare and Development.
Last month, they participated in a training dubbed “Capability Building for a Sustainable Agriculture with Rubber-based Diversified Farming System and Nursery Establishment”. Included in this P1-million project were planting materials and tools for the establishment of rubber-based diversified demo farm and rubber nursery.
Alfredo T. Corpuz, a professor in the University of Southern Mindanao Kabacan, Cotabato, who was one of the trainors, encouraged the farmers in barangay Del Monte to sustain their demo farm and nursery. He told them that there is big hope that their rubber will be sold out in the market with the growing world demand.
He said, in the first five years farmers will only have expenses; but, after that they will start tapping the rubber trees. They will, then, earn an average of P48,000 a year, he continued, from a one-hectare rubber farm. In ten years, he added, their net income from cup lumps will reach P112,886 a year.
Poverty and environment
Having his own rubber nursery in Mintal, Davao City, Corpuz said the Kalahi Cidss: KBB project in Brgy. Del Monte aims to empower the farmers to alleviate themselves from poverty.
Poverty, he said, “Dili kinahanglan og tubag kundili solusyon. Masolusyunan lang ni kung kita molihok ug i-empower ang atong kaugalingon,” he told his trainees.
Aside from a better income, Corpuz added, there are more benefits from rubber. “This will help in solving the problems of the environment, especially global warming resulting in climate change,” he said. No one will cut down a rubber tree in 30 years, by which time it stops yielding latex for farmers to have a quality life.
