Agriculture Business Week

Ordinary soil, farm wastes and cement equals durable hallow blocks.

Rural folks can beat the high prices of housing materials. Out of farm waste and ordinary soil, one can make durable hallow blocks comparable in strength to commercial ones. The hallow blocks can be made right on the building site fashioned similar to commercial hallow blocks. Although considered strictly non-load bearing, it is very satisfactory for low-cost housing. Its compressive strength ranges from i97 to 386 pounds per square inch (psi).

This simple technology, developed by the Forest Product Research and Industries Development Commission, makes use of a minimum amount of cement to make a stronger hallow block. One bag is enough to make 20 four-inch blocks or 12 six-inch blocks.

The first step is to gather agri-wood wastes such as sawdust, coconut trunk particles, sugar cane bagasse or ordinary soil. The latter has to be pulverized and sifted using a 1/4 inch wire mesh. Abaca waste, left after extracting fiber from the stalk, as well as coconut coir dust, the residue from processing coconut husk in coirflex plants, can also be used. Rice hull works too, but additional soil is needed when mixing this with cement.

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Posted on June 20th, 2009 under Income Booster, Soil. Tags: Hallow Blocks, Soil, Wastes. Comments: 2

The Philippine Textile Research Institute (PTRI) of the Department of Science and Techonolgy(DOST) found various ways of utilizing sericulture wastes. When processed, these wastes can be a source of income.

Sericulture consists of three major aspects: moriculture, cocoon production and silk reeling. Moriculture involves the cultivation of mulberry plants to produce leaves used as food for silkworms, while cocoon production involves controlled rearing of silkworm to produce quality cocoons. Silk reeling, on one hand, involves unwinding of silk filament from the cocoon with raw silk as the end product.

In all these aspects of sericulture, a considerable volume of wastes is generated. Since the time when cocoon production was commercialized in the Philippines, only good cocoons were utilized. The wastes were unutilized due to the lack of appropriate technology on waste utilization.

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Posted on March 20th, 2009 under Organic. Tags: Sericulture, Wastes. Comments: None

In these challenging times, the name of the game in agribussiness is reducing the cost of production without sacrificing quality of the end product. Besides lowering cost, the strategies should also be environment- friendly and sustainable.

That’s exactly what the owners of Brookside Farm, a big piggery operation in Bamban, Tarlac, have been pursuing with great success. One of the most remarkable steps they took a few years back was the construction of a giant biogas system in their newer and bigger piggery (2,000-sow level) in Capas, Tarlac. The biogas system which was built by an outside contractor cost them a fortune, some P11 million, but they are thankful because it is providing them a lot of benefits.

The owners, the Ho family who used to be in the cosmetics business (Kukuryu), also decided to put up a similar biogas system in the Bamban farm (1,500 sowlevel) with their own crew of engineers. They were able to build it at a cost of only P5 million. Chito Ho, the chief executive officer, said that thanks to the two biogas systems they have significantly lowered their cost of production, plus other advantages.

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Posted on March 8th, 2009 under Livestock, Technology. Tags: Biogas, Pigs/Hogs, Sow, Wastes. Comments: 8

A biodiesel project which utilizes waste fats and oils will soon be implemented in Aklan after the Department of Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund Executive Committee (ACEF-EXECOM) has approved a grant worth P14.93 million for the establishment of a 200-liter a day capacity biodiesel production facility at the AkIan State University (ASU) in Banga, Aklan.

The project which is the first of its kind in Western Visayas and the first biodiesel project by a state university in the country to receive an ACEF grant, is seen to reduce oil-containing wastes from a growing number of meat processors and food establishments in Aklan.

These oil-containing wastes, which are either dumped in the ground or sold to other food processors for recycling, can be converted into coco-methyl ester (CME), according to a research tem from ASU composed of Dr. Mary Eden Teruel, Engr. Tomas Ortega and Prof. Arlene de la Cruz.

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Posted on March 5th, 2009 under Going Green, Livestock. Tags: Aklan, Biodiesel, Fats, Oils, Wastes. Comments: 2

Gonzalo “Jun” Catans name has long been associated with household and industrial pest control. He has been in that business since 1961 and is still very much in the same business. Of late, however, he has also turned his attention in a big way to recycling farm wastes into gold.

He has three main commercial products recycled from various wastes. Foremost is activated carbon which has many industrial uses like purifying water supplies, softdrinks and many more. He makes activated carbon out of coconut shell which is plentiful in Southern Luzon where he also has his factory.

Another product is what he calls green charcoal, a fuel that produces higher heat than the ordinary wood charcoal. It is made of grass and other biomass like water hyacinth (wrongly called water lily in this country), tree leaves and many more.
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Posted on November 22nd, 2008 under Entrepreneurs. Tags: Entrepreneurs, Vermicompost, Wastes. Comments: 16