Agriculture Business Week

We were just talking a few minutes ago over lunch with a lady who consulted us on how to go about developing her dream farm a year ago. She is a daughter of a former mayor who left behind several hectares of upland farms that have not been made productive for so many years. In one farm, a 7-hectare property that was willed to her, there’s a caretaker who has been doing nothing productive except to harvest the nuts of the few coconut trees that have been planted many years ago.

The lady is a highly educated professional who until lately was doing a lucrative consultancy work in Europe, China and elsewhere. Apparently, she has accumulated a sizeable nest egg, and probably felt that in this life there are more important things than just making money. She gave up her consulting job so she could develop her dream farm and in the process contribute her share in developing the community.

When we first met, we suggested that she consider growing high-value vegetables. Which she liked very much for a number of good reasons. Vegetables have a short gestation period and they could be grown year-round with the use of the latest technologies.

We suggested to her then that she visit as many vegetable farms as possible. And more important, she should attend trainings in vegetable culture. Which she did, not just once but twice. She attended the training course of Harbest Agribusiness in Cavite, and then the off-season course in vegetable production by East-West Seed.
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One practical way of enabling poor agriculture students to continue their studies is being implemented at the Visayas State University in Baybay, Leyte. This is what they call “Vegetable Scholarship.”

Under this scheme, agriculture students who would like to earn some money while studying plant vegetables which they can sell to earn cash. The project was launched by the East-West Seed Company and VSU last year and the results are encouraging.

Four senior agriculture students are currently enrolled in the program. There were originally seven when the project was launched but three have already graduated. The students plant the latest varieties of high-value vegetables on 3,000 square meters provided by VSU for free. The seeds are also provided free by East-West Seed Company.

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