TANDAG CITY COCO FARMERS RECEIVE P400K CASH INCENTIVES FROM PCA By Nida Grace P. Barcena
Some 39 coconut farmers from the barangays of Buenavista, and Maitom, this city have received a total of P400,000.00 as their cash incentives from the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) through the Accelerated Coconut Planting and Replanting Program (ACPRP) amidst the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. A total of 15 members under the Coconut Farmers’ Organization (CFO) from Barangay Buenavista received a total of P136,000.00 while 24 members from the City Agriculture and Fisheries Council (CAFC) chaired by Ricardo Fernandez received a total amount of P264,000.00. The said program
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| October 24-30, 2020
was aimed to reduce the rural poverty in the coconut sector through increasing the coconut farmers’ production and their net income. Also, the program was designed to expand and/or rehabilitate the existing coconut areas by planting and replanting the coconut farms in the country, said PCA Surigao del Sur chief George Duterte Rasonabe. It also addresses the high demand for coconut products and by-products in the country and even internationally, he added. The farmerparticipants of the project will receive an incentive worth P20.00 for every seed nut produced, and P20.00
for the farmworker who will raise the seedlings of at least one foot tall with fully developed leaves as labor assistance at the established nursery of every people’s organization. They will also receive P45.00 for every seedling they transplanted and stabilized on the ground, said Rasonabe. It is both a participatory and incentive-based system approach guided by the PCA recommended Good Agricultural Practices (GAP). With a minimum of 0.5 hectares, a farmer can join the program given that he is a member of a PCA accredited organization or any other formal and informal organizations. (PIA-Surigao del Sur)
