Calapan City ̶ A three-year project aimed to deliver socioeconomic benefits to the coconut farmers of Oriental Mindoro recently started the groundwork for its implementation.
In an inception meeting, implementers and collaborators of the project “Development of coconut-based integrated income generating scheme in partnership with local government units and private sectors to reduce poverty in Oriental Mindoro” met with representatives of PCARRD to level off the different aspects of the project’s implementation.
The Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) led by Ms. Erlene Manohar, in collaboration with the local government unit of Oriental Mindoro headed by Governor Alfonso Umali, Jr., will implement the project funded by PCARRD.
The project is under PCARRD’s Integrated Coconut Research and Enhancement Development Program. PCARRD’s budget for the project’s first year of implementation covering five project sites in Oriental Mindoro is P1,690,753 or a total of P4,416,157 for three years.
As part of the project’s strategies, income-generating interventions such as crop diversification/intercropping, livestock and poultry integration, coconut-based product diversification, and nursery establishment will be integrated into the farmers’ practice.
Incidentally, the project is an offshoot of PCA’s and the International Coconut Genetic Resources Network’s (COGENT) earlier initiatives addressing the plight of coconut farmers in other parts of the country, which used a poverty reduction model developed by the two agencies. PCA and COGENT demonstrated that with the execution of different strategies in selected coconut areas, coconut farmers’ quality of life will be improved.