Growing of food in urban areas is a good way to use land efficiently. With urban gardening, residents of Poblacion barangays in Dumaguete can now produce their own food at the same time learn the process of various organic gardening techniques and in utilizing kitchen wastes as organic fertilizers.
Such endeavor would also facilitate the reduction of waste in the city. If people compost their kitchen wastes, quantity of trash will greatly diminish. Likewise, since household kitchen wastes can be processed into organic fertilizers, these can be utilized by urban residents as perfect soil for vegetable gardening. The process can help in addressing the problem of increasing garbage collected daily.
SAAD
The City Agriculturist’s Office is now in the drawing board for the implementation of urban farming for the eight Poblacion barangays in the City. Its P500K project proposal was approved for funding by the Department of Agriculture through its Special Area for Agricultural Development (SAAD) program. The approval and endorsement of the proposal by City Mayor Felipe Antonio Remollo to the DA paved the way for a smooth sailing process.
The SAAD program of the Department of Agriculture addresses the issues on hunger, malnutrition, and poverty through its organic agriculture program.
The program aims to expand the food base and promote sustainable food production and consumption system in food- and nutrition-deficient households or communities. The SAAD assistance to be provided to the Office of the City Agriculturist of Dumaguete will enable poor urban people, whether farmers or not, to produce carbohydrates-, vitamin-, mineral-, fiber-, and protein-rich foods around their homes by utilizing whatever space available in their limited backyard with containers planted to various types of vegetables.
The funding support from SAAD will, hopefully, provide nutritious food to beneficiaries in a period of four to five months and a sustainable food supply in a period of one year. The recipients will also be trained on how to sustain the project even after termination of the requested program funding. The program will be a “no-regrets” intervention, which has been found to be beneficial in times of calamities as well as under normal times.
The project will not only help poor people, but will also address the following concerns at the community level:1) reduce poverty and hunger by generating sustainable food, 2) address the gender concerns since women will play an active role in producing food and providing income for their families; 3) promote education through massive training and capacity building and expand the food and income base of the needy; 4) protect the environment through the use of organic inputs in raising healthy food products as organically-raised food is more nutritious and has more benefits to the human body.
Our scenario
Of the five cities and 20 municipalities of the Province, Dumaguete is the smallest in terms of land area. It covers a land size of 3,425.51 hectares (or 55.8 square kilometers), which constitute less than one per cent of the total land area of the province. It is however the largest in terms of population and economic output.
A major problem facing Dumaguete is its loss of agricultural land. Urban development has eaten away some agricultural areas. As more land is lost, it will become more difficult for people to produce the amount of food needed to feed the growing human population of the City.
Based on the Comprehensive Land Use Plan enacted by the City Council in 2000, 1,233 hectares have been allocated for agricultural purposes to supply the needs of the city population. However, beginning 2014, following the enactment of a City Ordinance by the City Council updating the Comprehensive Land Use Plan, the remaining agricultural land of Dumaguete has been reduced to only 675 hectares.
Agriculture, food security, urban farming
Agriculture in Dumaguete plays an important role in population health, growth of local economy, and community development. City farming is a matter of necessity – and the need for it — should be made known.
Hunger, nutrition, and health are linked to agriculture in many ways. Agriculture influences health, and health influences agriculture, and that both in turn have profound implications for hunger and poverty reduction.
The 2nd quarter of the 2016 Social Weather Survey (conducted from June 24-27, 2016) found that 15.2 percent or an estimated 3.4 million families experienced involuntary hunger at least once in three months.
OCA project thru SAAD
The City Agriculturist’s Office, in the implementation of its Urban Farming project, has the following goals and objectives: 1) Implement Urban Gardening program in every identified household in the Poblacion Barangays of the City; 2) Promote urban organic farming practices in small areas developed for food production purposes; 3) Develop small areas into farming entrepreneurial ventures with the use of containers and recyclable materials like plastic bottles, cans, sacks and pots as planting mediums; Make nutritious food readily available among 160 poor households even in times of disasters or abnormal times; Provide poor families opportunity to increase their income by 60 percent through the sales of their surplus vegetables from their backyard garden.
The project’s desired impacts and outcomes are the following: 1) Mitigated and eliminated hunger among 160 poor households in Poblacion Barangays 1, 2,3,4,5,6,7,8 in the City; 2) Reduced incidence of malnutrition by 80 percent especially among children of participating poor families and generate income to some; 3) Organic Agriculture practices in the City will be promoted and consumers will be provided with safe food for consumption.
To achieve the objectives and desired outcomes, the program will implement strategic interventions that will expand the food sources in every household and make nutritious food available in every home in the shortest time possible. To make this program sustainable, it will undertake massive capacity building and equip the project beneficiaries of the eight Poblacion Barangays with adequate skills in continuing with the project even after its funding’s termination.
Components
Public consultations through the Barangay Council of the recipient Barangay will be aired during its council meeting. Information through the Barangay Council will be discussed regarding the implementation of the program of the Office of the City Agriculturist.
Orientation of household recipients, strengthening and capability building, launching of the project Organic Urban Agriculture of the Poblacion Barangay of Dumaguete for implementation.
A food garden in every home produced in containers and recyclable materials. Recipients will be provided with seeds, organic inputs, tools, organic foliar fertilizers, and other farm needs. Containers or recyclable cans or plastic matters will be the recipient’s initiative for planting of crops. Technical staff of OCA will conduct monitoring, technical assistance, evaluation and provide demo referrals on the duration of the project.
Production and use of organic fertilizer in every home to produce high yield of healthy food crops and to protect the environment. Part of the capability trainings for the beneficiaries are the organic fertilizer production processes such as vermin-composting and natural farming input production foliar formulation, a liquid fertilizer extracted from indigenous matters like plant leaves, fruits, fish scraps, seaweeds and waste cook grains. Each household will be provided with a kilo of African Night Crawler earthworms that can convert biodegradables into high-grade organic fertilizer.
Sustainability
To make the interventions sustainable, the following shall be established: 1) Massive training and capacity building of project participants. Technical and skills development training on containerized gardening and organic fertilizer production will be conducted by Agricultural Technicians from the Office of the City Agriculturist, and personnel from other line agencies advocating such practices; 2) Establishment of food security garden in every Poblacion Barangay. To ensure sustainable quality planting materials for every household, the Office of the City Agriculturist will develop a propagating seed nursery for support to the needs of every household that run out of planting materials. At City Farmstead in Talay, there are agriculture personnel who can properly handle the task of establishing a seed nursery every cropping season. This way, household participants will be supplied with seedlings that are ready to be planted and what they will be doing is to prepare the containers with soil medium for planting and arrange it in an aesthetic way; 3) Provision of planting materials for each household. The Technicians will constantly monitor, assist, evaluate all undertakings of every participant household in order to realize and sustain the project even at the termination of support from the Office of the City Agriculturist; 4) Public awareness, field exposures, food fair exhibitions and multi-media campaign will be done in order to promote the Urban Agriculture of Dumaguete City with funding support from SAAD.
Accountability
Assurance that the project is implemented in accordance with the rules and guidelines of the SAAD Program; 2) Adoption of principles of good governance, transparency and accountability; 3) Adherence to the principles of the country’s Organic Agriculture Law in initiating cultural management practices.
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Author’s email: [email protected]
