A partnership between Progress Wood Products (PWP) and University of the Philippines Los Banos-College of Forestry and Natural Resources (UPLB-CFNR) was recently forged to benefit industrial tree plantation (ITP) research and development.
The partnership was formalized through an imminent sub-agreement signing between Mr. Jonathan Limlengco, owner of PWP and For. Amelita C. Luna, representative of UPLB-CFNR and project leader of the ongoing project, “Field Trial Plantation of Indigenous Tree Species for the Wood-Based Industry in Laguna and Quezon.”
Prior to the agreement, PWP and UPLB-CFNR had a meeting coordinated by the Forestry and Environment Research Division (FERD) of the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST-PCAARRD) represented by Dr. Dalisay E. Cabral, Industry Strategic S&T Program (ISP) Manager for ITP and For. Maria Kristina Abigail S. Lapitan, technical staff.
Based in Gumaca, Quezon, PWP is a local business known as supplier of toothpicks, wood chips, and tongue depressors using ‘malapapaya’ species and other industrial tree species. However, they had been confronted by productivity issues in their malapapaya nursery and plantation over the years.
With this partnership and as the local partner, PWP would benefit on production of quality planting materials, improvement of plantation practices, and increased production from the technologies that will be provided by UPLB-CFNR’s project team.
Moreover, UPLB-CFNR and PWP can collaborate to identify mother trees and make use of their full potential to provide superior quality seeds, establish field trial plantation, and develop standardized seed, nursery, and field trial plantation technologies.
During the meeting, For. Luna and her team shared their objectives with PWP along with their project’s target three industrial tree species: malapapaya (Polyscias nodosa), ‘bagalunga/paraiso’ (Melia azedarach), and ‘marang’ (Litsea cordata).
The participants of the meeting then visited the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and UPLB-CFNR Mechanized Nursery where For. Luna showed Mr. Limlengco samples of malapapaya seeds and seedlings. She also shared some of the project team’s practices that can help improve the production of quality of planting materials.
As a result of the meeting, the UPLB-CFNR team is now bound to visit PWP’s plantation in Gumaca for further evaluation of the site prior to planting seedlings and proceed with fulfillment of the project’s research objectives.