Our western orientation after several centuries of colonization and the influence of media is responsible for the seeming predisposition for most to prefer sub-temperate vegetables over the indigenous vegetables. Chinese cooking which prefers to use cabbage, carrots, broccoli and cauliflower further cultivated the minds of Filipinos to shift from indigenous vegetables to these sub-temperate vegetables.
Had it not for the initiatives of Department of Health secretaries like Juan Flavier and some of his successors, studies on the superiority of local vegetables could not have been discovered. Intensive studies into the nutritive and health values of these vegetables were also established later. Even deep into the 1990s, we still believed that broccoli is the only super-food available. It was only in the early 2000s that it was established that moringa or the balunggay that we know is far more important than any vegetable available worldwide.
Decades ago, we were led to believe that vegetable farming is all about growing cabbages, cauliflower, lettuce and other crops whose seeds have to be imported. These crops were also resource hungry, meaning that you need some capital to engage in it. Farmers especially in Baguio and Kanlaon are often in the strangle hold of financiers who are also the middlemen who dictate on the price and volume that they can deliver. These farmers are therefore helpless and cannot get out of the debt cycle.
The new awareness that indigenous vegetables are as nutritious as its exotic counterparts has resulted to the acceptance of our native species. Now, farming malunggay, camote and alugbati is as profitable as planting cabbage and pechay. However, planting native vegetable has a surplus- one need not buy seeds and other expensive inputs like insecticides as these species are often tolerant to pests and can survive in weather conditions that would stress exotic species.
Comparatively, a farmer who would grow indigenous vegetables on a 1,000 sq meters area would be able to earn at least P3,000 per month. Growing a mix of malunggay, leaf camote, alugbati, string beans or winged beans and planned in such a way that he would be able to harvest daily from this mix of vegetables, he would be able to earn enough to provide food on the table and send his children to school. He can also add periodically harvested fruit and root vegetables like squash and gabi so that he would have some sort of windfall timed for enrollment and graduations. This farm model had been adopted by many farmers in the remaining farm areas of Iloilo City whose daily routine is to harvest these vegetables in the afternoon, sort and pack them late into the night and deliver them early to the terminal or central markets of the city.
We also had the chance of visiting and helping farmers in the municipalities of Cabatuan and Janiuay. In the western part of Cabatuan, particularly the barangays of Akao and Ito, string beans farming is a way of life. The would farmers would plant rice in rainfed farms in the wet seasons but the paddies were deliberately made small with dikes wide and just elevated enough to provide water to the growing rice crop. Their money earners which are the string beans are planted on the dikes and these are harvested daily and shipped to Iloilo City in jeep loads.
Janiuay is famous for its eggplants and gabi. In dry lands and river banks, eggplants are planted commercially but the fringes are also developed into tagabang gardens. Like their Cabatuan counterparts, the Janiuay farmers also harvest in the afternoon, pack their crops immediately and ship early the next day.
If one were to visit these areas, one would see that the majority of houses are made of concrete and roofed with GI sheets. The prosperity brought by farming indigenous vegetables enabled these farmers to feed their families well and send them to school where they took up lucrative courses like seamanship and marine engineering that earned them dollars. Many of the children are also OFWs mostly nurses that earned well in other countries.
Yes farming indigenous vegetables may even be more profitable than engaging in sub-temperate crops. The income stream is much more varied and the risks are lower since one can spread them to various species, all of which are resistant and even higher priced. (To be continued).
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