RP lobbies for resumption of buko exports to Taiwan

After duly complying early this year with the requirements imposed by Taiwan quarantine people on he cadang cadang control program for the coconut industry, the Philippine government – through the Philippine Coconut Authority – is now lobbying for the immediate lifting on the ban on fresh buko exports to Taiwan, which has been earning $1.5 million a year.

PCA Administrator Danilo Coronacion said the Philippines submitted last year to the Manila Economic and Cultural Office a selective accreditation and containment scheme to ensure that all fresh buko expoted to Taiwan shall only come from cadang-cadang-free areas of Cavite, Laguna and Batangas.

Taiwan has been importing most of its buko requirements from the Philippines at the rate of 4,500 metric tons a year from 1988 to 1998. It only banned fresh buko after it supposedly found cadang cadang viroid (smaller than virus) on shipments coming from the Philippines.

But, industry sources said the ban was an offshoot of the disagreement over landing rights during the time of ousted President Estrada and just used the fresh buko as a leverage against the Philippines.

PCA Deputy Administrator for trade and market development Arturo Liquete said other areas like Bicol and certain portions of Samar could not be accredited as cadang cadang free because this viroid is endemic to these places.

The program also calls for the strict implementation of quarantine procedures imposed by the Bureau of Plant Industry especially for coconut products likely to be affected by cadang cadang, including the issuance of phytosanitary certificates for every shipment, Coronacion said.

Studies show that cadang cadang is now harmful to humans but can affect certain populations of palm plantations and Taiwan, having some 2,000 to 3,000 hectares planted to coconut, is merely protecting its own palm population.

But Liquete said "if the last shipments of fresh buko in 1998 indeed affected the palm plantation of Taiwan, then it must be reporting infestation by now. But there is not such report yet coming from Taiwan."

Early this year, Taiwan asked the PCA to submit a list of areas free from cadang cadang and the preventive measures being undertaken to keep these areas free from infestation or contamination.

The scheme, Coronacion said, was validated by the PCA Albay Research Center in a recently concluded national cadang cadang research review. Coronacion added that measures can for the mapping and identification of boundaries of the free areas and maintaining a buffer zone to control any sign of the disease.

The latest laboratory protocol on molecular assay for coconut is now available in PCA and will enable the detection of the cadang cadang viroid through periodic leaf sampling and analysis. Trees found harboring the viroid shall be immediately cut down, burned or replaced with resistant variety.

The same procedure will be applied on new areas to expand the cadang cadang free zone devoted for fresh coconut products for growing markets like Saudi Arabia and China.