Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) distributed tapping knives to rubber tappers of mountain municipality of Concepcion, the farthest northernmost town of Misamis Occidental aimed to provide additional income to farmers.
This is the second time in Misamis Occidental and northern Mindanao for DTI to distribute tapping knives.
DTI also introduced rubber sheets in the province to provide them improved their rubber products.
Distributed were 40 tapping knives during a two-day skills training on rubber production and rubber tapping held at the Activity Center of the Municipal Hall complex with trainor, Cirilo F. Cabural, an agricultural technologist from Lopez Jaena town but who was assigned in Concepcion for 18 years prior to his current place of assignment.
There were at least 113 participants coming from barangays Poblacion, Virayan, Small Potongan, Upper Potongan, Capule. Layaan, Upper Dioyo, Mantukoy, Upper Dapitan, Lingatongan, Upper Salimpuno and Maligubaan of Concepcion. Two came from Upper Bautista, Sapang Dalaga town and one from Jimenez town.
About 20 participants from barangay Capule were beneficiaries of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).
There were also 10 tapping knives distributed to rubber tappers in barangay Kanaw-Kanaw, more than 10 kilometers from the poblacion of Bonifacio town, the southernmost municipality of the province.
The giving away of 40 tapping knives were witnessed by Municipal Executive Assistant Edelberto Paundog and Municipal Administrator Engineer Lowell Baluyos.
Of 95 tapping knives ordered from a trader in Tampilisan, Zamboanga del Norte, only 50 arrived in time for the distribution ceremony. Ten were given in Bonifacio.
Concepcion is the farthest northern town of Misamis Occidental known for its rubber trees with a production volume of 3,000 kilos every month.
The seminar was sponsored by the DTI-Misamis Occidental, in and coordinated by specialists Mario L. Cuezon of the DTI regular program and Ian Rey Bitay of DTI CARP.
During the seminar, Cabural lectured on the theoretical and practical aspects of tapping. Cabural works as a municipal agricultural technologist of Lopez Jaena but was earlier assigned to Concepcion town for 18 years.
Cabural holds a national certification (NC) 2 in rubber production from Oroquieta Agro Industrial School in 2015, among the first graduate of NC 2 in rubber, the first batch in the whole of region 10. This was after a 10 day seminar and a five day review, the longest rubber seminar in Northern Mindanao.
Further, Cabural also attended various seminars in rubber from experts. He participated in a rubber seminar in Kidapawan City provided by the Provincial Agricultural Office of North Cotabato during a five day benchmarking in the said province and Bukidnon sponsored by the Mount Malindang Rubber Growers Association Inc., DTI, Provincial Agriculture Office (PAO) of Misamis Occidental and Department of Agriculture regional office.
According to him, Indigenous peoples like in Misamis Occidental are introduced in rubber tapping industry. Previously they were in kaingin-burning of forest areas and the government need to prevent the farming practice of burning forest areas. (DTI MisOcc)
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