Fruit demo garden to rise in NE university

CABANATUAN CITY – A fruit demonstration garden that will serve as a plant and technology exchange center for local and imported fruit trees using the multiple rootstock technology espoused by noted pomologist Bernardo Dizon is taking shape inside the 22-hectare campus of the Nueva Ecija University of Science and Technology (NEUST) here.

A 25-year memorandum of agreement will be signed on Sept. 6 by NEUST president, lawyer Hilario Ortiz, Dizon and Garry Dizon at the school’s Sumacab campus here.

Following the signing of the MOA, the Dizons will launch a free seminar-workshop on the propagation and culture of high-value fruit trees using the multi-rooted technology.

Under the proposed MOA, Dizon will establish, maintain and operate the demo plot and garden to showcase experimental fruit garden using the multiple rootstock technology.

Dizon said the project will be readily accessible to the farmers, orchard owners and interested backyard growers for their technological requirement in growing fruit and hard wood trees.

He said that with the project, farmers will be taught through actual planting the modern methods of culturing traditional fruit trees such as mango and non-traditional ones such as lychees, oranges, rambutan and durian which are potential dollar-earners.

“This project will disprove the wrong notion that non-traditional fruit trees cannot be grown in Nueva Ecija or anywhere else in the Philippines,” he said.  – Manny Galvez