Kablon’s passion

The uncertainties of farming have taught the Pantua family never to give up.

For example, when Dole Phils. stopped buying fresh frozen passion fruit last year from the Pantua’s KF Food Products, the family didn’t fold up the business. Instead, the family used savings over the years to put up a bottling plant and to aggressively sell bottled juice in the supermarkets of nearby General Santos City.

"With the fragile peace in Mindanao, we’re having second thoughts about sticking to the regional market and are looking at Metro Manila. To do that, we will need a reliable distributor and government help in reducing logistics costs," said Ernesto Pantua, Jr., who manages KF Food, the processing side of Kablon Farm.

Cash crop

Passion fruit is a woody vine used as perimeter fence around the 70-hectare farm in South Cotabato. The fence became a cash crop when a British consultant of a non-government organization mentioned in passing that there’s a huge market for passion fruit in Europe.

The season for passion fruit is from June to December. During this period, the farmgate price of the fruit drops to P6 a kilo in South Cotabato supermarkets. But in Canada, each fruit retails for P100. Just like Philippine super mangoes, the principal competitor of the Philippine passion fruit in the American and Canadian markets is Mexico.

KF Food was incorporated to process the farm’s unsold fresh passion fruit into frozen fresh juice. "We pioneered the processing of the yellow variety of passion fruit in the region," said Pantua. "To produce tropical fruits in season, we practice sustainable farming."

Eventually, KF Food processed passion fruit in other forms. Its tropical processed fruit products are popularly called the 3Js – jams, jellies and juice.

Diversification

Today, the company also produces pickled vegetables such as heart of palm and asparagus. To ensure freshness and quality, the fruits and vegetables are processed in small batches.

It was through KF Food’s pickled asparagus that the company entered the Canadian market. "A CIDA consultant spotted our pickled asparagus, which we were testing in a Davao City supermarket. The consultant immediately asked to see our farm," said Pantua.

After the visit, grant money flowed in under the craft village development program of the Department of Trade and Industry and the Canadian International Development Agency.

KF Food was the first Gawad Saka awardee in 2000 for high value commercial crops processing.

" Our ultimate goal is to produce globally competitive quality foods, principally for the domestic market," said Pantua. KF Food has already taken some long strides towards its goal.