Ukraine On My Mind Disrupting Global Food Chain – How Do You Supply Fertilizers To PH Farms Without Problems?

What can the Philippines do when it cannot import enough fertilizers for her farmers? Secretary of Agriculture William Dar sees it as a question of importation given local production.

(“Fertilizer on hand” image from News24, news24.com)

ANN says, “DA Execs Review Plans To Avert PH Food Shortage Amid Crises” (Author Not Named, 31 March 2022, Facebook post, Facebook.com):

Members of the Department of Agriculture (DA) national management committee assessed [how to improve] the agency’s immediate responses and [sustainability] plans anchored on the OneDA Reform Agenda, to prevent further agricultural economic slowdown and [cushion] threats of food insecurity caused by the ongoing pandemic and [conflict] between Russia and Ukraine, during a meeting held on March 28-30 in Iloilo City.

I take it that the committee members (unidentified) agreed on what ANN’s report is saying, as follows:

1.     fertilizer subsidy

2.     funding for urban and peri-urban areas

3.     research on aquaculture & mariculture

4.     feed formulation, and

5.     enhancing the food delivery & marketing systems.

As an agriculturist with firsthand experience in farming, I will mention and comment only on #1: fertilizer subsidy. ANN says:

In response to the high prices of fertilizer, [Secretary Dar] calls for the adoption of a balanced fertilization strategy to lower production costs while improving technology efficiency levels. According to him, DA is now mass-producing the biostimulant “Bio-N” through the University of the Philippines Los Baños, [the supply of] which will be ready for distribution to farmers by the wet planting season.

June starts the planting season. Now, while wishing UP Los Baños pluck in producing Bio-N, an organic fertilizer, for many farmers:

I am advising that the DA consider other local organic fertilizer formulations by scientists such as (a) indigenous microorganisms – ask UPLB prof Ted Mendoza for his practical formula, and (b) “EPP Technology” – ask UPLB scientist Eduardo P Paningbatan.

I am also advising Mr Dar for DA to try my own 56-year-old organic farming procedure I call “Rotavator Organic WEALth” (Weeds-Enriched Automatic Layer of Trash Triggering Terrestrial Health),where the rotavator cultivates the soil, along with any vegetation, to create a layer of trash all over the field instantaneously. To help farmers produce their own WEALth, I advise the DA to provide each group of 17 farmers free a hand tractor equipped with rotavator/rototiller blades, those in a counterpoised L & J assembly. I will personally demonstrate how to operate the hand tractor with rotavator so that the desired results will be achieved: an automatic mix of soil & weeds (& crop refuse if any) is created all over the field.

The process is similar to green manuring, which is plowing a standing legume crop into the soil with the disc (or moldboard) plow. The difference is that in green manuring, the field is plowed and the legume crop such as mungbean is coveredby soil clods – while in WEALth, soil & plant materials are beautifully mixedinto a mulch, no additional labor necessary!

We need all the organic fertilizers we can make locally!@517