BALANGA CITY, Bataan – The project S&T Community Based Farm (STCBF) on Mango in Bataan conducted its field day recently.
Held at the farm of Anthony Villanueva, one of the 15 mango farmer cooperators at Brgy, Tuyo, Balanga City, Bataan, the field day aimed to promote tested S&T interventions on mango production and post harvest.
Project team from the Bataan Peninsula State University (BPSU) headed by its president, Dr. Delfin O Magpantay; CLARRDEC representative, Dr. Marlyn Patricio; PCAARRD Technology Transfer and Promotion Division Director, Dr. Melvin B. Carlos; UPLB technical experts, Drs. Oscar Opina and Elda Esguerra; and Balanga local government unit (LGU) representatives and farmer leaders joined the event.
The STCBF on Mango is one of the collaborative technology commercialization projects of BPSU and PCAARRD.
Greeting the participants, Dr. Magpantay, valued PCAARRD, UPLB, CLARRDEC-CLSU and other partners’ assistance to the project which is expected to enhance production and improve farmers’ income.
Dr. Melvin Carlos, in his message, on the other hand, explained the importance of technology transfer in a community, citing in particular the gains of STCBF.
“The mango project in Bataan is the only STCBF project for the said commodity which is implemented together with other STCBF projects for other commodities in other parts of the country,” Dr. Carlos said.
Dr. Carlos emphasized the importance of LGU’s participation and the cluster farmers as well as the assistance of other agencies. He also stressed that sharing of experiences can help more farmers to access available technologies.
Dr. Hermogenes M. Paguia, BPSU Abucay Campus Chairman of Extension and STCBF project leader, gave an overview of the project and cited the positive results of science and technology interventions to mango growers in Bataan.
These S&T interventions include Good Agricultural Practices (GAP), Integrated Cultural Management (ICM), and Postharvest Quality Management (PQM).
“The project explores the potentials of cooperators’ existing mango trees as a viable economic activity by following science and technology interventions and proper management,” Paguia said.
For her part, Dr. Elda Esguerra, project’s postharvest technical expert from UPLB, demonstrated the mango hot water treatment techniques to farmers. She also explained that mango fruits subjected to the technology are latex free and ripe evenly.
Farmer cooperator Anthony Villanueva said that he earned more than 400% during the last cropping cycle and wished that the next cycle could be more productive.