MATI CITY, Davao Oriental, Philippines – Between gold and coco coir, a housewife here testifies the latter makes them eat, and sends her child to school.
Michelle Luguib, mother of two and a wife of a small-scale miner said her humble earning from weaving coco-twine has augmented the meager income of her husband from the mines.
She admits mining is still their main source of income, but what supports most of their daily and basic needs and her child’s schooling is her own livelihood.
“With my own earning from our coco-twine production, my husband who stays in the mining site for two weeks or a month, does not have to worry anymore if we still have something to eat or to support our daily needs,” Luguib said.
Coco-twine is made from winding together coco fibers, which are considered waste from coco peat production. Local traders here consolidate both coco peat and coco-twine for export mostly to China.
While the province of Davao Oriental is considered as the coconut capital of Mindanao, the local government here sees the crop as the “tree of money.”
Michael Sibbaluca, technical adviser to the city mayor said “coconut has been dubbed as the tree of life since from its roots to the tips of its leaves ot can be used to sustain life. But more than that, here in our city and in Davao Oriental we see it as an entire source of viable income that’s why we call it the “tree of money.”
Proving that there is more to coconut than copra, local businesses in the city and the province ventured into coco by-product processing during the slack of copra prices in 2006 when prices reached as low as P5 per kilo.
“We learned that there is a huge market for coco geo-textile or coco-twine mats so we seized the opportunity,” said Sibbaluca.
Today even small farmers who do not own vast coconut plantation benefit from the coco-product value adding.
“When coco twining (technology) was introduced to us, we were just using the makeshift twining machine made from those small and cheap China-made three-bladed electric fans to produce 20-40 hanks of coco-twine,” Luguib said.
Luckily she was a member of the Nagkahiusang Katilingban sa Bahandi sa Kinaiyahan (NAKABAKA), a people’s organization initially formed to rehabilitate the mangrove area in the coastal part of the city.
Sibbaluca said that when the city government was thinking of providing a livelihood package as part of their task in the mangrove rehabilitation, NAKABAKA was endorsed to the Department of Agriculture’s Mindanao Rural development Program.
Under the program’s Community Fund for Agricultural Development, the coco-twine production plus fishing gear project were provided enough funds. The purchase of the proper twining machine dramatically increased their production.
Today the women twiners can produce at least 300 hanks per week which can be sold roughly at P4,500. One coco-twine measures 14 feet long and sells at P1.50.
To maintain their volume of production, the women consolidate their hanks to reach the volume requirement of at least 1,000 tons. And from the original 15, the number of women twiners has now increased to 30.
“When our neighbors knew we were earning at least P20,000 in a week (consolidated income), many became interested and joined in. After the training and the necessary organizational dues we accepted them since we need to meet the volume of production,” Luguib said.
“(Coco) twining (which is just in their respective backyards) is very easy to do and fits well with our lifestyle. After our chores we can do twining, while chatting with our neighbors,” said Luguib, adding: “this is really the opposite of what we used to do when we did not have this project before. We just idled and chat most of the day, very unproductive.”
So easy is coco-twining that even their children were able to help.
“On their free time, specially last summer, our children also helped in twining. Since it’s not really hard labor we taught them to twine by themselves,” Luguib said.
As a result of a productive summer they did not worry about buying school supplies and enrolment fee.
“In fact, with what we earned we were able to buy cellular phones for our children and provide them a daily allowance,” Luguib proudly said.