COTABATO CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Jan. 20, 2009) – Lowly farmers of Pigcawayan town in North Cotabato province have discovered a favorable way in dealing with pests, particularly the obnoxious black bug that eats up rice and corn stems, the Filipino's staple food source.
In the village of Bulucaon, farmers’ ingenuity transformed the once destructive bugs into helpers when the swarm is gathered and processed to serve as organic fertilizer.
Santiago Martin, who has been a tiller for nearly two decades, said the presence of black bugs at the onset of the full moon has made farmers miserable with low grain production as vast track of their rice and cornfields have been severely ruined.
Some 50 farmers of Bulucaon met and agreed to stop the menace by trapping the bugs through the use of a 5,000-watt mercury vapor lamp.
Martin said in three days time, they were able to collect some 54 sacks of black bugs caught during the night as these are attracted to bright lights.
“The brightest the light, the more these black bugs are attracted to, and you can easily trap and gather them for disposal,” Martin said.
The lunar-cycle mass appearance of black bugs, which agriculture officials said came from Malaysia in the late 1970s has become a farming dilemma to rice and corn producers, North Cotabato Gov. Jesus Sacdalan said.
Bulucaon farmers said their experiment last year paid off when collected black bugs had been subjected to a solar drier and the dried pests mixed with garden soil and served as organic fertilizer.
“When applied in my kalamansi orchard, I was surprised to have an increased production of nearly 50 percent from the usual produce,” said Martin, who also noted an enormous palay harvest when the same fertilizer was applied in his rice field.
Sacdalan said he will have agriculture experts conduct a scientific study on the fertilizer potential of dried black bugs mixed with other organic materials.
Danilo Manaay, another Bulucaon peasant, has urged the national government to support the newly-found experiment by providing each farming village with the lamp and a power generator as a ready anti-black bug device.
Abusama Alid, agriculture director for Central Mindanao, vowed to support the Pigcawayan discovery in his regular report to the central office.
“When scientifically proven effective, we will have the newly-found method applied to other areas in Central Mindanao,” Alid said.
Romulo Ramos, who has been a farmer for more than 50 years, said prior to the bug menace, farmers in Mindanao used to produce 80 to 100 sacks of rice per hectare.
The swarm attack, Ramos noted, tremendously reduced rice harvest to only 30 to 40 bags per hectare. (Ferdinandh Cabrera)
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