Procurement of P244-M cacao seedlings ongoing

• Source:http://www.sunstar.com.ph/davao/business/2016/01/22/procurement-p244-m-cacao-seedlings-ongoing-453073
• Friday, January 22, 2016

By Ace June Rell S. Perez

AS 2016 serves as the pilot year for implementation of the Cacao Double-Up Program (CDUP), some five million cacao seedlings, amounting to P244 million, are on the process of procurement.

"Procurement of these cacao seedlings already started and is ongoing. These are targeted to be planted before the planting season of the year," Undersecretary Janet M. Lopoz, executive director of the Mindanao Development Authority (Minda), said.

She added that Mindanao regions are almost done with the procurement process.

"Once the planting materials are delivered, the first batch of the program will take off," Lopoz said, adding that the challenge mow is on how they catch up the availability of the certified quality materials.

The program which is aimed at to double up and even surpass the country's current cacao production, which is anchored by Minda and Department of Agriculture (DA) and in partnership with Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA), Department of Trade and Industry, Department of Science and Technology (Dost) and the Cacao Industry Development Association of Mindanao Inc. (Cidami).

For the pilot year of implementation, CDUP has a total of P500 million budget.

"Initially DBM will pour some P500 million for the pilot year of implementation which will be on 2016,"Lopoz said in a recent interview. Of the P500 budget, P169 million of which will be allocated to Minda as counterpart for the initial budget and the rest will be allocated to DA, PCA, and other concerned government agencies.

According to Cidami data, the country’s total cacao production is pegged at some 10,000 metric tons (MT) in 2014.

The projected global demand of the cacao industry is pegged at 5 million MT with global deficit of 1 million MT. The country through the program is targeted to contribute 100,000 MT annual production by 2020.

The program will cover a total of 200,000 hectares and will target to plant 100 million cacao trees. Under the program the cacao seedlings are targeted to be intercropped with the coconuts trees.

It will be composed of three phases, the production, processing and the marketing stage.

“At present, we are working on an inventory of the certified nurseries as we target quality cacao, it must certified of Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) certified,” Lopoz said.