Veggie farmers turn to high value crop

TUBA, Benguet – Cigarette manufacturer Philip Morris Philippines Manufacturing Inc. (PMPMI) is helping upland vegetable farmers learn new skills in planting a high-value alternative crop–tobacco. At the same time, farmers traditionally growing planting tobacco on the lower plains of  Pangasinan, La Union, Ilocos Norte and Sur are also being re-oriented to shift to higher grounds and produce better "full-flavored" tobacco. 

Last month, another set of 50 farmers from nearby Trinidad and various villages in this province completed their six-month training on tobacco growing, making them the third group of vegetable growers to graduate from the country’s first tobacco training center.

The first beneficiaries of the tobacco training school were Ibaloi farmers who knew nothing about tobacco farming. Today many of these farmers are also teaching other farmers the proper way of growing upland tobacco.

"Planting tobacco is not easy, it’s more challenging compared to planting crops like Baguio beans and carrots, but we are realizing good incomes and we intend to continue planting it and use it also as a hedge to keep prices of vegetables profitable for us," said Manolo Mat-an.

Farmers here are learning the rudiments of tobacco planting from  international agronomists of  PMPMI and its leaf buyer, Trans-Manila Inc. (TMI), as well as from agriculturists from the National Tobacco Administration (NTA) and the Benguet provincial agriculture office.

"Without the support of the government, the private sector, and the farmers themselves, this training wouldn’t become a success," said PMPMI Managing Director Chris Nelson during the graduation rites.

The PMPPMI which is strongly supporting the initiative proposed almost three years ago by TMI has a lot of stake in the project.

"It is this partnership which will allow the production of high quality tobacco in the mountains," said Nelson, adding that the tobacco company has committed to buy all of the farmer’s produce that meet its quality standards.

TMI vice-president Mattew Diong broached the scheme to grow upland tobacco, particularly in Benguet after extensive research to determine suitable crop management practices in upland areas.

"At that time, tobacco being gown in the lowlands suffered from poor quality because of the soil salinity. Farmers in Ilocos and Pangasinan  were rampantly using unacceptable farm management practices such as the improper use of inorganic fertilizers, particularly chlorine-based commercial fertilizer varieties," noted Diong. Add to that the strong competition posed by China which is now growing tobacco for the export market.

Thus, leaf buyers turned to other sources to meet their requirements. Farmers  were being told by the National Tobacco Administration to shift to other crops such as corn and vegetables.

This was heartbreaking for tobacco farmers in the lower plains because tobacco has been grown in the Philippines since the Spanish colonial period in the 18th century. It’s grown mostly in Region I like the Ilocos provinces which enjoy a long dry season. For years, many tobacco-farming families prospered because of  favorable tobacco prices in the world market.  Lucio Tan, one of the country’s business tycoons, owns Fortune Tobacco. Other major  international tobacco firms including PMPMI also dominate the local tobacco scene, operating  manufacturing factories and capitalizing on satellite marketing firms to  provide support to tobacco farmers through loans and seeds of superior varieties.

On the other hand, upland vegetable farmers in Benguet were also distressed over falling farmgate prices of  temperate vegetables. The demand for their produce was getting weaker by the day because of  dirt-cheap smuggled vegetables such as Baguio beans, onions bitter gourd or ampalaya, cucumber, carrots, lettuce and celery finding their way into wet markets.

Fortuitously, the  results of  the soil tests and other peripheral research on growing tobacco in the highlands were encouraging enough to justify the establishment of a tobacco training center in the uplands.

"We found a way to resuscitate the ailing local tobacco production sector. The results show  that the we could grow the kind of high-quality export tobacco leaf that Brazil produces also in their upland areas. The weather here, the soil conditions, the temperature are suitable for tobacco farming. The next step for us was to convince the vegetable farmers to grow tobacco which was not too difficult under the circumstances," recalled Diong.

Farmers undergoing training are being oriented about the advantages of  growing better varieties of full-flavored tobacco which have lower  nicotine content and higher sugar content, making them more aromatic. 

"The varieties planted upland are far more superior than the filler-tobacco varieties grown in the lowlands and can fetch premium prices," noted Diong.

During the training period, agronomists emphasize to farmers the importance of  producing quality tobacco using more environment-friendly farm practices.  They are taught the latest techniques in preparing a  seed bed, transplanting the seedlings as well as curing and classifying the leaf. They are also taught how to construct a cost-effective curing barn.

One of the critical components of the training program is the Tobacco Identity Preservation Program (TIPP) which essentially advocates the planting of  only certified tobacco seeds and absolutely discourages  the use of all genetically-modified tobacco seeds, if these are already existing. 

Under the TIPP, farmers are taught not to repeat the bad practices being done in lowland tobacco farms that led to the deterioration of  tobacco quality. On the first year of the project, about 40 tons of  tobacco were harvested from the pilot farms and this doubled to 80 tons in 2005. This year, production is projected to be even higher with more farmers going into tobacco farming as a profitable alternative crop.

Nelson recalled being very impressed with the quality of tobacco grown here and promised farmers PMPMI will buy all of their produce if they continue to commit and practice good agricultural practices.

"We are not telling farmers that tobacco will take over vegetable farming as their main source of income, but we are telling them that they could plant a high-value commercial alternative crop that would allow them to raise their incomes and have a steady livelihood throughout the year," said Nelson.

On the way back to Marcos Highway from the training center in Tabaan, a group of men, presumably farmers, are trekking the four-kilometer stretch to the training center to line up for the next training period.

"We have definitely generated a lot of interest among farmers not only here in the uplands but also from the lower plains which is good. It will ensure that the local tobacco industry will survive. It is not dying as widely perceived but it is undergoing a very positive transformation. Farmers want to grow quality tobacco," noted Diong.