CRAIG JAMIESON may have been in the Philippines for only six years, yet he already considers this country as his very own home.
He had been to other parts of the world, but he chose to reside here after the United Kingdom, particularly in Harpenden, Hertfordshire, where he was born.
Armed with a bachelor’s degree in horticulture from the Scottish Agricultural College and a master’s degree in bioenergy via the Royal Agricultural College, he is introducing some technologies that may help save the archipelago’s uplands and rediscover the potentials of nipa palms, which are abundant across our islands.
Geographically, the Philippines is considered as an “upland country,” because 60 percent of its 30 million hectares are classified as such. The uplands are rolling to steep areas where both agriculture and forestry are practiced on slopes ranging from 18 percent upward.
Uplanders, which comprise about 30 percent of the country’s total population—with almost half of them living within forests—are often referred to as the “poorest of the poor” among Philippine society, since they survive below the poverty line.
Upland inhabitants are primarily poor farming families with unsecured land tenure. Most of those who are engaged in farming belong to “the least educated, least paid, least healthy, least hopeful and most neglected [in terms of] agricultural development of all people in the Philippines.”
A study commissioned by the National Research Council of the Philippines found out that subsistence-based food production, rather than forestry, is the overriding priority of upland farmers.
It’s no wonder the Philippines is almost devoid of its forest cover now. But there is a solution in sight.
“The problems that beset the uplands in the Philippines, particularly deforestation, can be curtailed by planting perennial crops,” observed Jamieson.
Biomass consultant
IN agriculture, perennialization refers to the conversion from an annual-based crop system to a yearlong, enduring one.
As advocated by the World Agroforestry Center (founded in 1978 as the International Council for Research in Agroforestry, or ICRAF, in Nairobi, Kenya), where Jamieson serves as a biomass consultant, perennialization involves “the substitution of annual crops with perennial plants and trees as they provide continuous ground cover and deep-root systems for soil protection and stabilization, while increasing carbon stocks and reducing soil nutrients lost by leaching.”
Jamieson explained: “The integration of trees into arming practices has the potential to sustain land productivity, [and provide] useful tree products such as firewood and fodder.”
Based on existing studies, he said the system can provide the following benefits to the environment: extend the productive life of soils; develop resilience to extreme rainfall events, droughts and insect pressures; reduce land run-off that creates coastal dead zones with disastrous effects on fisheries; maintain the quality of surface and groundwater; and build food security.
“Compared to annual crops, perennials have many ecological advantages,” Jamieson said. “First, they live longer and develop deeper root systems over time; hence, perennials have greater access to groundwater. Also, their deep-root systems make them less prone to wind and rain damage, [and thus help] farmers adapt to climate extremes and protect the soil from erosion.”
With such, farmers can save money from buying chemicals like pesticides and herbicides. “Aside from the obvious savings on expenses, the planting of perennials, likewise, reduces the impact of chemicals on local watersheds,” the consultant explained.
The ICRAF official went on to say that perennials could be in the form of grasses, herbs, vegetables and fruit trees. Examples include avocado, banana, grapes, basil, fennel, garlic, ginger and radish.
“Finding alternatives to annual cropping systems becomes more urgent as the world faces the need to mitigate and adapt to climate change,” Jamieson said. “Perennialization could play a significant part in providing more robust, productive and environmentally benign agricultural systems in the future.”
Nipa: livestock feed
IN the lowlands, Jamieson observed that nipa palms grow profusely along the country’s coastlines and estuarine habitats. These could be one possible solution to the problem of expensive feed for livestock.
“For hundreds of years, indigenous populations in the Philippines and Indonesia have been tapping the sweet, sugary sap of palm trees and feeding them to animals as their primary energy source,” he told the BusinessMirror, and added that nipa palm can be considered as feeds for livestock.
“Two-thirds of the world’s agricultural land is actually used for feeding livestock, rather than humans directly,” Jamieson stated.
He lamented, however, that, “Despite its potential for being a major solution for food insecurity, this traditional technology has been largely neglected and almost forgotten by farmers, agricultural scientists and policy-makers.”
Using nipa palm as feed for livestock is not only viable, but economically feasible. “In the modern era, scientific studies have backed up the effectiveness of this practice, showing the palm sap to be the livestock equivalent of rocket fuel,” the Briton revealed.
He cited a study conducted in Cambodia: “Pigs fed daily with 7 to 8 kilograms of palm syrup had an average growth rate of 250 to 550 grams per day over five months. This lean gain is much higher than the 60 gram per day average growth rate of pigs which consumed conventional feeds.”
The study showed that to produce the aforementioned volume of palm syrup requires tapping one to two palm trees per day.
“Aside from increased daily lean gain, using nipa sap for producing palm juice to feed pigs gave farmers 14 times higher economic returns per tree than using it for producing sugar syrup,” Jamieson reported.
The productivity of palms is truly extraordinary, he said. “Unlike annual crops, they are able to photosynthesize 365 days a year, converting sunlight to sugar that can be directly extracted and used,” he explained.
“It’s fundamentally a more efficient process than most of today’s food production.” In addition, the consultant affirmed it “enables much higher yields: typically, four times the calorific yield per hectare, compared with annuals like corn.”
Jamieson observed that the common annual crops have been the focus of agricultural science and technology development over the last century. In comparison, nipa palm tapping remains a cottage industry until today.
As nipa palm grows in brackish water, it does not require precious freshwater for its production. As such, the tree “saves both land and water—two critical resource issues facing world food security,” Jamieson said.
Largest scientific community
JAMIESON earned his master’s degree in 2006 and came to the Philippines six years later. “I had done lots of consultancies in bioenergy prior to that: for the UK government, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, [as well as] others, but I really wanted to go beyond just consultancy and try to put something into practical use.”
He went straight to Los Baños in Laguna, as it has the largest scientific community in Southeast Asia. “It has a lot of good people in my field whom I could work with, to write proposals, and develop ideas together.”
“I had no job offer when I first came here; it was one of those calculated risks that worked out in my case,” he recalled. “About a year after moving to the Philippines, I had secured about $1 million in funding for a project to research bioenergy from rice straw, and I ended up leading the three-year project on behalf of International Rice Research Institute.”
But it was during his stint at ICRAF where he got the opportunity to live in the Philippines for longer period. “I have done work for them, mainly around preparing funding proposals and using my horticulture and bioenergy backgrounds to develop project proposals for trees on farms,” he said.
On why he preferred to stay in Los Baños, he said: “[It] is a very suitable base for me to do what I wanted. I like that it’s close enough to Manila to be convenient, but far enough away to have some peace and fresh air. I like to have space to think.”
When asked about the people, he replied: “I enjoy being with Filipinos. When I lived in London before, [they are] some of my best friends. I find them easy to get along with.
Jamieson further revealed, “I have traveled around many amazing countries in Asia, but whenever I go back to the Philippines, I [say to myself:] ‘Ah, that’s better.’ It feels like ‘home away from home’ somehow. I’m thankful to the Filipinos for taking me into their hearts.”
Image credits: Jimbo Albano, Henry Tacio, Robert Finlayson