PH Agriculture – We Have To Harness The Power Of The Webs, Plural

Thinking of how to move knowledge to help Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie move the new PH Agriculture from Poverty to Prosperity for All, I have been studying the power of the Web. Surprise! I found 2 Webs instead, where a web is a network of relationships: 

(1) The Internet
(2) The Multi-Purpose Cooperative.

Internet as 1^st Web? For the connecting flow of knowledge in Agriculture.

Cooperative as 2^nd Web? For the connecting flow of work from seed to spoon.

With its webinar series called SOLVE – SEARCA Online Learning & Virtual Engagement – SEARCA has made the Internet a farm & firm reality what has only been dreamed of by state colleges & universities in the Philippines, like UP Los Baños, where its headquarters have been located in the last 50 years.

To be reached and enriched, what remains is for farmers to become active members of a supercoop so that they can be supported completely starting from obtaining the quality seeds to sow up to marketing farm produce & products to obtain their proper profits. (I first wrote about the Supercoop 5 years ago: “The Supercoop[1],” Common Cause.)

Lockdown or no lockdown, the New PH Agriculture must move, not hurriedly but constantly, for better and for better. Which crop, field, time, method? Knowledge is power!

The average Filipino farmer thinks he has gotten away with his choices, and he is an industrious fellow, but he is still poor. He has no friends, only friendly people who take advantage of him from seeds to selling.

The constant flow of the Internet will tell & sell the Filipino farmer on the need not only to think but act as a businessman all the time – which the farmers find hard to do! The cultivator is industrious when it comes to work, but his mind is lazy when it comes to mathematics.

In CNN’s news report, “Gov’t Must Focus On Agriculture Sector For Long-Term Sustainability, Says Commerce Leader[2]”(30 April 2020), George Barcelon, President Emeritus of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce & Industry, said the Department of Labor had announced they were targeting 1 million jobs in the provinces after the lockdown.

I say those million jobs or more will have to come from Agriculture; thus, the urgent need for Webmasters in Agriculture and Industry!

Mr Barcelon said PH must focus on agriculture for long-term sustainability, and I thank him a million times for saying that! Mr Barcelon is thinking of PH’s “high food import dependency,” and so he says, “focus must be given to the agriculture sector when dealing with the coronavirus impact on the economy.” He is thinking starting from cultivating the lands up to cultivating the markets here and abroad.

Mr Barcelon also said the Philippines is “lagging behind other countries due to lack of productivity and infrastructure” – and that’s exactly why we need the infrastructures of the Internet and Supercoop, not only farm-to-market roads and warehouses and the like.

Smoothly flowing networks of knowledge, expertise and work will enrich us all!@517

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[1] https://icommoncause.blogspot.com/2015/12/the-supercoop.html

[2] https://cnnphilippines.com/news/2020/4/30/focus-on-agriculture-sector-covid-recovery.html?fbclid=lwAR2

UP, Ateneo Lead 7 Philippine Universities In Serving Science – Without A Human Face!

Our friendly neighbor UP Los Baños humanities professor (newly Retired) Jerry R Yapo has just come up with a Facebook sharing on the news “UP, Ateneo Lead 7 Philippine Universities In QS World, Asian Rankings.” London-based Quacquarelli Symonds, QS, has come out with its annual world and Asia university rankings. I’m a UPLB alumnus myself, so I share Mr Yapo’s pride. What’s Prestige for?!

Yet: Universities are doing Research and the Intellectual Outputs are Science or Knowledge in various forms, but do they serve the people? Unfortunately No. They serve the Researchers!

In contrast: As Asean first, running now is SEARCA Online Learning & Virtual Engagement, SOLVE, a webinar series to help farmers and gardeners in Southeast Asia. Aged 100+ vs 54: The old fogies will now learn from the new kid on the block. SOLVEd!

Years ago, I blogged, “Sleeping Journals Lie. Science As The Waterloo Of Universities[1]" (25 January 2013, Frank A Hilario). My point was PH technical journals were sleeping on the job! They still are.

The basis for the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings are: Teaching, Research, Citations, International Outlook, and Industry Income. For the QS ranking, these are measured: Academic Reputation, Employer Reputation, Faculty Student Ratio, Citations per Faculty, International Faculty, and International Students.

UP had subjects ranked as follows:

Development Studies – #51-100 top universities
Performing Arts – #51-100 top universities
Law and Legal Studies – #251-300 top universities
Medicine – #301-350 top universities

Now, are farming families in there somewhere? Nowhere to be seen! (Look again at the above family image I painterized and then superimposed.) Those universities do not teach farmers, hardly does UP Los Baños, the national university for agriculture. The researches done are what the faculty members want, not what society needs; and there are hardly any technical papers written and published out of those research results. This is an Editor In Chief speaking, someone who has been in and out of UP Los Baños in that capacity the last 45 years. Sleeping researches lie!

So, without realizing it, our friend Mr Yapo is citing good work for the faculty but non-work for the farmers and their families. (original poor family image from World Food Programme[2])

When Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie was still Director General of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, ICRISAT, he came up with the goal/slogan, “Science with a human face.” As the Team Captain, he brought his group from dead last to first, and the CGIAR group applauded. New and improved science was visibly serving the poor farmers in Africa and Asia, not to mention India where ICRISAT was based. The Philippines benefited from ICRISAT research too – say “sweet sorghum,” that thing that is sweeter than sugar.

What we need today from PH universities are science pushers, knowledge advancers, technology innovators and system inventors or re-inventors who push PH agriculture from the 20^th to the 21^st century with the farm families in the frontlines – high world or Asia rankings welcome but not necessary!@517

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[1] https://frankahilario.blogspot.com/2013/01/sleeping-journals-lie-science-as.html

[2] https://docs.wfp.org/api/documents/WFP-0000015508/download/

PH DA Sees Windows & Gates In Online Services – Likewise, Food Consumers!

This news report actually makes me very happy, by Karl R Ocampo: “DA Expands Online Services[1]” (02 May 2020, Inquirer.net); here are the first 2 paragraphs, leader included:

Technology-driven platforms to steer movement of farm goods

The Department of Agriculture (DA) is expanding its services through online-driven platforms to address the new landscape for buying and selling agricultural products.

The agency has pushed new programs such as e-Agriculture and e-Kadiwa to bring farmers and fishers’ produce to more consumers as the new coronavirus pandemic has dragged down their income.

Mr Ocampo writes that Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie announced all that in the first of a series of SOLVE webinars sponsored by SEARCA, where SOLVE is acronym for SEARCA Online Learning & Virtual Engagements.

Manong Willie says the Department of Agriculture, DA’s, “movement and delivery of goods would now be steered by technology.” Thus, “The Kadiwa Express will use cloud and other information systems in tracking goods…. to monitor the produce while in transit and to determine where the blockade in transport (may be) happening.” By e-Kadiwa, consumers can order items online to be delivered by partners such as Grab.

Mr Dar said, “Price stability, price affordability, (are keys) to growing the economy. We need to promote digitalization of agriculture even in marketing.”

Glenn Gregorio, Director of SEARCA, sponsor of that webinar, said that “consumers now appreciate the connection between the quality of food on their table and agriculture.” Interesting how during this lockdown, this connection is now appreciated by the people looking via the digital distance! (cellphone image from Shopee[2])

To ensure quality of food produce, Mr Ocampo said, “The organization has also facilitated the distribution of high-quality seeds with the Bureau of Plant Industry, BPI.” BPI Assistant Director Glenn Panganiban said since the lockdown, “their office had been flooded with calls from people requesting seeds and inquiring about urban farming.”

“Urban farming” – the popular and accepted term; actually, “urban gardening” is the correct term.

You do not farm vegetable plots – you garden them. There is no vertical farming, only vertical gardening.

Manong Willie said the DA was considering 10 to 15% of Metro Manila for urban gardening. So far, the DA has partnered with Quezon City and Manila.

The DA had sought additional funding of P1 billion “to ease the public’s unfounded fears over food supply by opening more Kadiwa outlets in Metro Manila.”

And why is the DA into selling and delivering farm produce? Manong Willie said, ““The best way to sustain stable prices of basic farm and fishery commodities is to have a continuous and unhampered movement of goods from origin to the markets, [especially] in Metro Manila and other metropolises.”

As adjunct, I suggest the DA encourage and support the more advanced state colleges & universities in regions to go into digital agriculture, where farmers can choose topic and attend anytime via the now ubiquitous cellphone. Thus, with modern technology, for millions this becomes quite a reality:

A thing of beauty is a joy forever!@517

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[1] https://business.inquirer.net/296289/da-expands-online-services?fbclid=IwAR26Aim7cnAEm5SD0ao0uuotRIT864otM82-AHMhZPvei1_ucsF9gqdVgGM

[2] https://shopee.ph/P30-Pro-Smart-Phones-6GB-128GB-Ultra-thin-Smartphone-Face-Fingerprint-Lock-Cellphone-i.165467748.2572727869

Quezon City Today – Welcome To The Joy Gardens!

Chito Chavez writes in the Manila Bulletin that on Wednesday, 29 April 2020, Mayor Joy Belmonte announced that the QC government is intensifying its urban farming campaign and will soon distribute 6,000 starter kits to residents. Above, the superimposed image I call “Joy of Gardening” (from Getty Images[1]); Ms Joy has brought gladness to Quezon City’s gardeners.

6,000 starter kits! It’s called “#GrowLokal: Libreng Binhi Starter Kit” that contains each free seeds of ampalaya, eggplant, kangkong, okra, mustard, pechay, tomato, 2 kilos of organic fertilizer, potting bags and a guide on proper planting.

Ms Joy said it was the Department of Agriculture, DA’s, way of appreciating her “Joy of Urban Farming” initiative in her city. It was actually 10 years ago, when Ms Joy was still Vice Mayor of QC that she launched that project in the Circle, where in 2019, more than 43,000 visitors received their own seeds and seedlings.

The new initiative will be implemented by QC, the Agricultural Training Institute, ATI, and Bureau of Plant Industry, BPI, both of the DA, in coordination with the QC Small Business and Cooperatives Development and Promotions Office (SBCDPO). Ms Joy says, “They will also spearhead capacity-building activities, and continuously provide assistance to communities in the maintenance and sustenance of the site.”

The news report did not say but does imply to me that aside from home gardens, the new initiative is targeting the Quezon Memorial Circle, where in 2010 the project “Joy of Urban Farming” had 3 demo farms – they were actually demo gardens. So now, contributing my own enthusiasm, though I am not a Quezon City resident, I will refer to the whole thing as Joy Gardens.

The Circle (actually an ellipse) is all of 26 ha. Now, if we have more Joy Gardens, demos, in the Circle, more people will be attracted to the site, not only city residents but also tourists from far and near – enjoying the unhurried sights and good food – after all, the Joy Gardens grow all those vegetables truly organically. No other places can claim that as of now – and we have the Department of Agriculture as partner.

For the Joy Gardens, Ms Joy said:

The (QC Food Security Task Force) will be created to meet Zero Hunger initiatives, one of the sustainable development goals of the United Nations, in order to end hunger, achieve food security, improve nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture for the city.

Ms Joy is thinking of community and commercial gardens where the DA through the ATI and BPI will be invaluable in providing the growing inputs. “They will also spearhead capacity-building activities, and continuously provide assistance to communities in the maintenance and sustenance of the site.”

In the meantime, through the Joy Gardens, Ms Joy says:

We want to make sure that our people will have access to a healthy and safe source of food even during this pandemic. Through this (Joy Gardens) program, they can now grow their own vegetables.

6,000 Joy Gardens! Quezon City will become known as “The Gardens City of the Philippines!”@517

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[1] https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/planting-tree-garden-and-gardening-icons-royalty-free-illustration/932790794

Digital Extension Coming Up! Actually, It’s Already Here At SEARCA

In the above image, you may not see it, but I see the magic words Digital Extension. Filipino. Director of Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study & Research in Agriculture, SEARCA, Glenn B Gregorio is a Filipino; with this SEARCA SOLVE webinar series, the Philippines is finally launching an Internet-based seminar series in farming and gardening, this one on containerized home gardening and modular farming. The ATI, IRRI, PhilRice, and UP Los Baños each is capable of offering such, but have not done so – it takes an innovative leader like Mr Gregorio to do it!

The invitation is this:

Join us at the second SEARCA SOLVE Webinar on 06 May 2020, Wednesday, 10 AM Philippine time (GMT +08 00) via
Facebook http://fb.com/seameo.searca
Zoom: https://bit.ly/solvewebinar.

2^nd. Webinar I never associated with SEARCA – I never associated it with UP Los Baños either, or DA. SEARCA was just a graduate school in Southeast Asia, high standards, but that was all.

Mr Gregorio surprises me as a modernizer, a dedicated knowledge pusher; here, with topics such as containerized gardening and modular farming. Really, this is helping SOLVE Food Insecurity In The Time Of Covid-19 Pandemic.

So, SEARCA has become the digital center of agricultural knowledge in the Philippines, also Southeast Asia. And I never imagined it to be!

On 17 May 2019, less than 3 months before he was appointed Secretary of Agriculture, William Dar/Manong Willie, in Part 2 of his column titled "SCUs And Unifying R&D Efforts" (16 May 2019, The Manila Times, manilatimes.net), Manong Willie reiterated his wish that in state colleges & universities, SCUs, R&D efforts "must also be complemented with stronger extension programs, so smallholder farmers and fisherfolk would benefit from (mature) technologies immediately. And I mean, immediately!”

So, for almost 1 year, I have been at a loss how the SCUs can rise to the national challenge of some “stronger extension programs” for farmers and fishers. Here comes the unexpected: SEARCA coming up with a webinar series on agriculture in general. Problem SOLVED!

SOLVE is the acronym for SEARCA Online Learning & Virtual Engagements. This is “a webinar series highlighting actions on agriculture and rural development.”

I say the SEARCA Webinar Series is ingenious in 3 ways:

(1)  Expertise. You are not going to present in a webinar if you don’t know your subject matter. To lecture in gardening, you must be a gardener yourself; your credibility, or lack of it, will show if you attempt a webinar in modular farming.

(2) Mastery of computer apps. You have to master your computer apps: PowerPoint, Adobe Acrobat, Microsoft Paint etc).

(3) No expense! Except a WiFi connection.

The SEARCA webinar is different from the trainings offered by the Agricultural Training Institute of the Department of Agriculture; different from those by the Technical Education & Skills Authority; by PhilRice; and by IRRI. The SEARCA webinar is based on actual experience, not theory. It is your introduction to the field; if you want to know more, send your email for further learning. The best is yet to come!@517

Coronavirus – Waiting For A Vaccine Is Waiting For Godot! And It’s Not The Best Solution Either!

Dealing with Covid-19, DoH doctors & UP mathematicians should learn health science from farmers!

Agriculture must go on – but the Enhanced Community Quarantine, ECQ, as dictated by doctors and mathematicians, is making it extremely difficult for government to function, private sector to operate, and farmers to grow our food – for all to benefit.

Being an agriculturist and a creative science writer, I shake my head when I see how doctors of the Department of Health, DoH, and mathematicians of the University of the Philippines, UP, are handling the pandemic:

DoH and UP are handling the Covid-19 crisis
not scientifically but only technically! Bad.

Dona Magsino of GMA News writes, 13 April 2020, “Philippine Covid-19 Problem May Last Until Jan. 2021 If No Intervention Will Be Done – DoH[1]”. Ms Dona’s first paragraph:

The Philippines' battle with coronavirus disease 2019 (might) drag on for months if proper interventions would not be implemented, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said Monday, citing studies by experts.

Those are modelling studies. My Internet search found “Covid-19 Forecasts in the Philippines: Insights for Policy Making (Updated as of April 22, 2020)[2]” news by J Mikhail Solitario), researchers & paper authors being Guido David, Ranjit Singh Rye, and Ma Patricia Agbulos, all of OCTA Research of UP.

The objective of the OCTA research borrows from the objective of the ECQ. (Here, the OCTA report misspells “Enhanced” as “Enhance” (no d). That is a tell-tale sign to this Editor In Chief that the paper has not been carefully reviewed and/or edited. This misspelling is just an introduction to a graver error!

The OCTA mathematicians say:

Ending the ECQ prematurely may disrupt the flattening of the curve.

Based on this math-based research paper, Ms Vergeire said (my free translation):

They had 3 modelling estimates, and they arrived at differing timeline ranging from up to the 3^rd quarter of the year, and worst case scenario, up to next year January.

The experts are maximizing the objective of the ECQ as “flattening the curve” before the ECQ is lifted. Ms Dona says, “(Ms Lim) said that it could take about six to 18 months before a vaccine against the new strain of coronavirus can be developed and distributed to the public.”

The ECQ is based on the absenceof a vaccine to fight the virus! What if the vaccine is never found?!

A more important question:
“Why are we relying on a vaccine when we can fight the virus on its own terms!?”

All doctors know that our body has an autoimmune system. Time for doctors to learn from farmers!

Now, how does a farmer grow healthy crops? No, you don’t plant “healthy crops” – rather, first you ensure that the soil is healthy, so it will grow healthy crops! The farmers who wait for the disease to strike before they strike back with their vaccine – chemical control – are the unscientific ones! (image of “Healthy Crops” from morningchores.com[3])

Our modern doctors are behaving like our olden farmers: unscientifically!@517

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[1] https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/news/nation/733740/philippine-covid-19-problem-may-last-until-jan-2021-if-no-intervention-will-be-done-doh/story/

[2] https://www.up.edu.ph/covid-19-forecasts-in-the-philippines-insights-for-policy-making-updated-as-of-april-22-2020/

[3] https://www.pinterest.ph/pin/406942516333709042/

If Biodiversity Is Our Garden Of Eden, Where Does It Start? You Missed It Already!

You think Pandemics and Biodiversity have nothing to do with Agriculture? Think again!

Coronavirus, pandemics. I google for “pandemics biodiversity” (excluding double quotes) and Google gives me 15 million results. Everybody is talking about pandemics and biodiversity! Like so:

“Biodiversity Loss Is Hurting Our Ability To Combat Pandemics” – weforum.org
“Biodiversity, Pandemics And The Circle Of Life” – greenbiz.com
“Ban Wildlife Markets To Avert Pandemics, Says UN Biodiversity… – theguardian.com
“Want To Stop The Next Pandemic? Protect Wildlife Habitats – TIME
“Biodiversity And Emerging Diseases” – NCBI

Okay, already! In the Philippines, we have right at the upper campus of UP Los Baños the headquarters of the Asean Biodiversity Center, ABC, with Theresa Mundita Lim, as Executive Director. Janvic Mateo writes on “Biodiversity Protection Needed To Prevent Future Pandemics” (26 April 2020, The Philippine Star[1]) and says, “Lim said the current pandemic highlights the need to mainstream efforts to protect biodiversity to prevent future spread of illnesses.”

Ms Lim was saying, “Exposure to wildlife in general can result in transmission of illnesses.” The danger is real. She said:

There’s more exposure now to the wilderness areas, between people and wildlife. It’s not just the markets, not just the trade, but the encroaching of what used to be wildlife habitats, decreasing habitat areas.

So! We humans continue to disrespect Mother Nature! What you do comes back to you. One of the forms this disrespect comes back to us is pandemics.

Ms Lim was saying, “(We have) to protect biodiversity.”
The question is: How do we do that?

If you look at the above image, from The Conversation[2], the answer is:

You: “We go back to the forest!”
Me: “We go back to the farms!”

We have millions of hectares more farms than forests.

Martine Maron of the University of Queensland throws a very intriguing question in the title of her article, which also contains its own answer, and which is inspiring (source cited above):

“Food Vs Fauna: Can We Have Our Biodiversity And Eat, Too?”

Ms Martine says:

So, we have to feed an extra 2.5 billion people by 2050. For those of us interested in the future of biodiversity on this planet, this poses an uncomfortable challenge…

She is encouraging “land sharing” – using “wildlife-friendly” farming.

I am extremely glad Ms Martine does not say, “Farm the mountains!”

Now, look at the above image again. Because we prefer to cultivate certain crops, there is not much diversity in the farms, is there? There is not much diversity in the plant life on the slopes of that mountain either, is there?

So, where do we start the new consciousness on biodiversity?

The obvious answer is: The mountains.
The immediately visible and more intelligent answer is: The farms.

What do I mean by biodiversity on the farms?
Multiple cropping.
Intercropping.
Three-Sister planting.
Trap cropping.
Agroforestry.

If we leave no bare patch of ground unplanted, we will see biodiversity like we have never seen before – and the wildlife will thank us, including the flowers and the bees!@517

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[1] https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2020/04/26/2009890/biodiversity-protection-needed-prevent-future-pandemics

[2] https://theconversation.com/food-vs-fauna-can-we-have-our-biodiversity-and-eat-too-3178