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01, The More The Merrier – 156 Lipa City Families Succeed With Community “Stables And Greens” Gardens

When families think big, think village, they can succeed where singular others fail. So we have this news from the Department of Agriculture (DA): “Lipa City Families Showcase Successful Community ‘Stables & Greens’ Gardens” dated 12 February 2021.

The complete name of the DA project is: “Stables & Greens: Agri-Livestock Integrated Support to Covid-19-Prone Areas” (ALIS-Covid Project). The aim of “Stables & Greens” is “to mitigate the effects of the pandemic by promoting agri-livestock household production for consumption and the use of various technologies for meat, egg, and vegetable production.” Actually gardens & farms.

Not just 1 family but we are talking here of 156 families in the village of San Benito in Lipa City, some 55 km away from Manila. Even as their Stables & Greens project started only last year, they have already completed 3 harvests from their 1,500 sqm community garden, or from only 15% of 1 ha.

I say: The many have succeeded with a few!

This is a collaborative project among the DA-Agricultural Training Institute (ATI)-International Training Center on Pig Husbandry (ITCPH), East-West Seed Company, and the Lipa City local government unit (LGU). Quintin Piol, Barangay Chair of San Benito, says the participating families “are very active in maintaining their garden with the help of the ITCPH and East-West Seed.” ITCPH is piggery, and East Weed is vegetables – the news release did not mention any livestock involved.

Actually, the DA project is aimed at assisting not only the village of San Benito but 5 other villages of Lipa City: Pinagtong-olan, Marawoy, Lodlod, Tambo, and Banaybanay. If those villages want the project to benefit them, they have to be very active as San Benito.

The DA is trying to help them – still they have to help themselves!

Mr Piol says the harvests go directly to the families’ dining tables, while they sell the rest to “earn extra income and contribute to the group’s revolving fund.”

“The group’s revolving fund” – That’s the (community) spirit!

The upper image shows Secretary of Agriculture William Dar, who is ex-officio DA Chief, visiting the project site in San Benito. He said the garden should be sustainable even after the project ends in 2022. That to me explains the raising of the group’s revolving fund. (Also from San Benito, the lower image[1] is from Agriculture.com.ph.)

Later, Mr Dar instructed the DA Regional Field Office in Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal & Quezon) to introduce off-season planting of crops and other technologies to increase the yields and incomes of Calabarzon families. He said the target Stables & Greens communities should also be included in the “Food Basket for Metro Manila Project” by which provinces nearby would produce and supply raw materials for food for the national capital region.

The DA is all-out supporting farmers especially during this Covid19 lockdown. Lipa City Mayor Eric Africa thanked Mr Dar and the DA for the many projects such as animal dispersal, seed distribution, and farm-to-market roads, aimed at benefitting disadvantaged families. The DA at your service.@517


[1]https://www.agriculture.com.ph/2020/09/13/stables-and-greens-gardens-bring-food-and-hope-to-communities-in-batangas/

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