Coconut’s versatility. Innovative minds. Busy farmhands. This would probably articulate the setting at the Philippine Coconut Authority-Zamboanga Research Center (PCA-ZRC), in San Ramon, Zamboanga City, as seen by a group of PCAARRD officials and staff during their visit at the Center recently.
Dr. Patricio S. Faylon, PCAARRD Executive Director and a group of directors from the Council’s technical research divisions visited the center to monitor a number of PCAARRD-funded and PCA-ZRC led projects.
One such project pertains to the reinvigorating of the Philippine coconut industry through coconut somatic embryogenesis technology. The project aims to mass-propagate plumule-derived outstanding coconut varieties/hybrids in eight tissue culture laboratories through somatic embryogenesis in order to augment the replanting of senile palms, typhoon-damaged and CSI-infested palms.
Other equally important projects implemented at the Center are those on the improvement of coconut varieties through genomics, genetics and molecular breeding; the use of coconut genetic resources for high value and emerging products; development of coconut synthetic variety and isolation of superior breeding populations for coconut seed farm establishment; and the establishment of GMA FV1 coconut seed farm in a farming community using genetically enhanced parental lines.
Paying a visit to the center for project monitoring purposes, together with the PCAARRD Executive Director were Dr. Melvin B. Carlos, Director, Technology Transfer and Promotion Division and Officer-in-Charge, Applied Communication Division; Dr. Jocelyn E. Eusebio, Director, Crops Research Division; Dr. Feliciano G. Calora, Director, Forestry and Environment Research Division; Dr. Marcelino U. Siladan, Assistant Director, Forestry and Environment Research Division; Dr. Mari-Ann Acedera, Director, Marine Research Division; Dr. Edwin C. Villar, Director, Livestock Research Division; and Mr. Andre Acedera, Assistant to the Executive Director.
It was the mixture of the wonder of coconut, science and technology, and hard work of a relatively small group of scientists and farmhands that make the center a bustling center which may soon be the envy of other research centers.
The center produces high variety coconut seedlings such as Orgullo Tall, Baybay Tall, Tacunan Green Dwarf, Galas Green Dwart, and Aromatic Green Dwarf. It also produces high-value cocosugar, virgin coconut oil, sweets, and non-food products such as bio-fuels and handicrafts.
PCA-ZRC holds the biggest (450-hectare) coconut seed garden/plantation in the country. It features 262 accessions consisting of 107 talls, 53 dwarfs, and 102 hybrid/line collections.
The PCA genebank in Zamboanga has become the most important assemblage of local and foreign coconut ecotypes with emphasis on indigenous materials. It also features the synthetic variety of coconut recognized/considered as the first of its kind in the world.
The center also boasts of a two-storey building which houses the new food processing laboratories on coconut high-value products like VCO and coco-sugar and a tissue culture (TC) laboratory for Makapuno. The laboratory provides in vitro grown makapuno seedlings capable of producing 100% makapuno nuts.
Also found in the two-storey building is a tissue culture laboratory for Somatic Embryogenesis for the mass production of outstanding coconut hybrids/varieties.
With financial assistance from DOST-PCAARRD, several embryo culture satellite laboratories have been established to mass produce Makapuno seedlings for interested coconut growers. These are located in Albay, Pangasinan and Cavite (for Luzon); Leyte (for the Visayas); and Davao, and Zamboanga (for Mindanao).
The PCA-ZRC building was blessed in a simple religious ceremony and was formally opened in a ribbon cutting ceremony led by Dr. Patricio S. Faylon.
Aside from the tissue culture laboratory and food processing facilities, PCA-ZRC proudly operates its coconut industrial processing facilities which demonstrate the various activities which make coconut a versatile commodity for non-food products. With the use of the appropriate machinery, the laboratory converts coconut’s biowaste into other useful products such as coco coir, biofuel, and other coconut products.
In a welcome ceremony hosted by PCA, Mr. Ramon Rivera, Deputy Administrator, presented the status of the various projects funded by PCAARRD such as the project on coconut embryo culture for the mass propagation of coconut seedling and the utilization of coconut genetic resources for high value and emerging products, among other projects.
Mr. Louie Peñamor, PCA-ZRC Administrator, on the other hand, expressed the Center’s gratitude for PCAARRD’s funding support for its various projects which the Center badly needed considering its status as a self-sustaining government entity.
Mr. Peñamor also mentioned PCA-ZRC’s long years of collaboration with the Council as shown by the historical focus of such cooperation from germplasm to tissue culture
With coconut’s economic importance as the Philippines’ top agricultural export, Faylon encouraged the Center to pursue its efforts on varied research and development activities from generation of quality planting materials to value adding and expressed the Council’s support for such initiatives.
The visit at PCA-ZRC winded up with the symbolical planting of an aromatic coconut tree by the PCAARRD Executive Director at the PCA-ZRC symbolizing the long lasting partnership and the common aspiration of the two agencies.