COVID RESPONSE PROGRAM PCA gives incentives to coco, banana farmers

The Provincial Coconut Authority (PCA) has been instrumental to the coconut farmers in this time of
crisis brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic by launching the programs that give incentives to them.
Bohol PCA Provincial Manager Emiliano Romero and PCA Senior Agriculturist Primo Galendez said
that they just met this year’s target of planting 398,000 coconut seedlings of the “Incentivized Coconut
Planting/ Replanting Project” formerly “Participatory Coconut Planting Project”.
They said the project would give incentives to coconut farmers that would reach the total amount of
P85 per coconut already planted and stabilized using his own good seedlings.
Under this program, a coco farmer is entitled to plant a maximum of 1 hectare (ha.) and a minimum
of ½ ha.
They said that they are now also preparing for the implementation of this program next year of the
same number of coconut seedlings to be targeted.
Romero and Galendez explained that even if they already completed the program for this year, the
coco farmers could still avail of the same incentives using another source of funds as granted under
Republic Act 8048.
They said that RA 8048 allowsto utilize funds coming from the collection of coconut cutting fees of
which under this they targeted to plant about 7,000 coconut seedlings or to be planted to 50 has. of coco
farm areas.
Romero and Galendez said that aside from this, there is another program of PCA that would also help
the coconut farmers in this time of crisis which is the “Banana Intercropping Project.”
They bared that this project promotes the planting of carnava variety of banana to intercropat the
coconut farm wherein a coconut farmer is entitled to plant a maximum of one ha. (200 banana plants) and
a minimum of ½ ha. (100 banana plants) at P25 incentive per banana planted.
They said that the listing to avail the program is now on going and what the farmers would like to do
is to contact the PCA agriculturists assigned in their areas or to visit to their Municipal Agriculture Office
in their respective towns to be listed.
This project has targeted 700 has. of coco farm to be planted with carnava variety of banana
throughout Bohol and this will be started within this year.
According to them, the province of Bohol has 104,000 has. of coconut farm wherein the bigger areas
have planted are located in Balilihan, Inabanga, Carmen, Catigbian, Loay, Lila, Valencia and other
coastal municipalities. (Atoy Cosap)
INCENTIVISED PROGRAM. Bohol PCA Manager Emiliano “Emil” Romero (extreme right) and PCA
Senior Agriculturist Primo Galendez disclose programs of the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) giving
incentives to coconut farmers through “Incentivized Coconut Planting/ Replanting” and “Banana
Intercropping Under Coconut Farm” projects to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 pandemic.