Wellness Guru Cory Quirino was the special guest during the opening of the 2nd Pinoy Organic Festival held at the AANI Weekend Market at the FTI, behind Sunshine Mall, in Taguig City.

Don’t look now, but the trend is increasingly going towards organic. That means using less and less chemical inputs in agriculture and using more and more natural products for growing not only plant crops but also farm animals.

The recent 2nd Pinoy Organic Festival attracted participants from far and wide. There were groups of advocates from Bacolod, Cotabato, Nueva Ecija, Bicol Rizal and of course Metro Manila. Most of the groups have been undertaking moves mostly on their own.

What is apparently needed now is for the various groups to come together and work together as one voice.. That way, the government authorities could be swayed to come up with the

right policies and programs that will hasten the conversion from chemical farming to natural farming.A more frequent interaction of practitioners is in order so that the various techniques used by organic and natural farming advocates could better be understood and appreciated.

Some call themselves organic farmers. Others would rather be identified as natural farming practitioners.

As Andry Lim of Davao City explains, as a natural farming practitioner, he does not only use organic fertilizers like compost and vermicompost. He also uses a lot of products of fermentation with the use of beneficial indigenous microorganisms.

What is needed is not only to teach small scale farmers to produce their own non-chemical inputs. One way to hasten the adoption of natural farming practices is to encourage big time investors to go into large scale production of inputs for the producers of organic products. Hopefully, that would make it possible to come up with less expensive production inputs.

Of course, there are a couple of relatively big manufacturers of bio-organic fertilizers that we know, namely Jun Catan of Mapecon and Rene Sumaoang of Novatech. Catan has been producing vermicast by the tons everyday while Novatech has franchisees in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao producing Durabloom fertilizer. Besides them there are also producers of Bio-N and Vital N. But their outputs are not enough for the whole country. It is encouraging to know that they are already there, though.. More investors are needed.

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AANI FARM TOUR. If you want to see how high-value vegetables are grown, better join the AANI Farm Tour this Sunday, June 7. The attendees will visit the Harbest Demo Farm and Training Center in Tanza, Cavite. Get in touch with AANI at its office at the FTI in Taguig City or at the Quezon Memorial Circle, Quezon City.