DAVAO CITY—The warm reception by food connoisseurs and food exposition visitors to two halal delicacies at the International Food Exposition in Manila has perked up the interest of the Department of Trade and Industry’s office in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (DTI-Armm).
So much so that the DTI-Armm plans to support the products so these meet international
standards of packaging.
According to Prince Shoudery Galo, Trade and Industry Development specialist of the DTI-ARMM, they were surprised to the warm reception given to the locally produced delicacy chips, or tipas, and the coconut sugar.
“During the first day, we already sold more than 1,000 packs of sweet and spicy tipas and 500 packs of coco sugar,” Galo said. “Aside from its all-natural ingredients, both are halal-certified products, too.”
The tipas, a sugar-coated flour, is produced in Maguindanao, while the coco sugar is locally manufactured in Sulu.
Several other products from the ARMM were being exhibited and displayed at this year’s International Food Exhibit (Ifex) at the World Trade Center in Pasay City. The Ifex has put up the Mindanao Pavilion to showcase all the specialty products and commodities from the six regions of the island, including those of the ARMM.
The ARMM is composed of the Central Mindanao provinces of Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur, and the southwestern-most island provinces of Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi.
The DTI-ARMM would want to explore the possibility of getting the assisted products with bar codes and comply with the international standards. Galo said doing so would allow the products join the
export market.
The DTI-ARMM helps small-scale producers in the region so they come up with products that are well-packaged and labelled.
“We conduct training on proper product development, labeling, packaging and marketing to the five provinces with between eight and 15 MSMEs [micro-, small- and medium-scale enterprise] per province,” Galo added.
The ARMM was represented in the Ifex by The Moropreneur Inc. (TMI) and Tubig Samin Agricultural Producer Cooperative. The two companies are local consolidators of agricultural products in the region.
Other products seen with “vast potential” for commercial production were mostly agri-based food products, such as cassava, palay, coconut, corn, seaweed and rubber.
The ARMM has posted noticeable growth over the decade, and posted 7.3-percent gross regional domestic product growth last year. This figure outpaced the growth by the National Capital Region, at 6.1 percent, and including the national growth rate of 6.7 percent.
The Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA) said the growth was primarily brought by the recovery of the agriculture sector, which resulted to the improvement in production of crops, livestock and poultry.
“This truly defines the resilience of ARMM, to be able top the country’s growing regional economies amidthe turmoil that hit the region last year,” MinDA Secretary Datu Abul Khayr Alonto said.