Anti-marijuana livelihood project in Kapangan, Benguet fails
04/07/2008 | 02:03 AM
(Updated 4:19 a.m.) LA TRINIDAD, Benguet - Yacon, a healthy rootcrop touted as a sugar substitute, was also seen as a crop that would wean Kapangan farmers away from marijuana production.
But after more than a year that the Philippine National Police signed a memorandum of understanding with the Kapangan municipality and other government agencies on the cultivation of yacon as an alternative to marijuana growing, the parties found out that there was no market for their crops and some went back to growing the illicit but far more profitable crop.
Kapangan Mayor Roberto Canuto said that the yacon production was a failure.
"There are still no roads and when they bring their yacon to the market, they find that there is hardly any demand," Canuto said.
Yacon is a rootcrop native of Peru and is crunchy like turnips. Furthermore, it is as sweet as sugar and dietitians tout it as the sugar alternative for diabetics. Cordillera farmers started planting yacon three years ago but unfortunately, Filipinos have not caught on the health fad promised by yacon.
In December 2005, the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), the PNP, the Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operation Task Force (Aidsotf), the Police Regional Office (PRO)-Cordillera, and the regional heads of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the Department of Agriculture (DA), the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) and the Department of the Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) all signed the MOU to help make Kapangan free of marijuana.
Canuto said that roads or at least tramlines should have been installed instead. He said that the lack of access was what brought the poor Kapangan farmers to cultivate marijuana and risk arrest in planting and transporting them.
He, however, said that although some of the farmers returned to marijuana planting, there are far fewer marijuana plantations now in his area than before.
Canuto said that the plantations are now located in the remote area where the boundaries of Kapangan, Kibungan and upland La Union meet.
Last week, Ilocos police destroyed P97 million worth of marijuana seized in that area. - GMANews.TV
But after more than a year that the Philippine National Police signed a memorandum of understanding with the Kapangan municipality and other government agencies on the cultivation of yacon as an alternative to marijuana growing, the parties found out that there was no market for their crops and some went back to growing the illicit but far more profitable crop.
Kapangan Mayor Roberto Canuto said that the yacon production was a failure.
"There are still no roads and when they bring their yacon to the market, they find that there is hardly any demand," Canuto said.
Yacon is a rootcrop native of Peru and is crunchy like turnips. Furthermore, it is as sweet as sugar and dietitians tout it as the sugar alternative for diabetics. Cordillera farmers started planting yacon three years ago but unfortunately, Filipinos have not caught on the health fad promised by yacon.
In December 2005, the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), the PNP, the Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operation Task Force (Aidsotf), the Police Regional Office (PRO)-Cordillera, and the regional heads of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the Department of Agriculture (DA), the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) and the Department of the Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) all signed the MOU to help make Kapangan free of marijuana.
Canuto said that roads or at least tramlines should have been installed instead. He said that the lack of access was what brought the poor Kapangan farmers to cultivate marijuana and risk arrest in planting and transporting them.
He, however, said that although some of the farmers returned to marijuana planting, there are far fewer marijuana plantations now in his area than before.
Canuto said that the plantations are now located in the remote area where the boundaries of Kapangan, Kibungan and upland La Union meet.
Last week, Ilocos police destroyed P97 million worth of marijuana seized in that area. - GMANews.TV
