Negros Oriental\u2019s Provincial Agriculture Office (PAO) urged the expansion of planting areas for cacao and coffee in the province amid a growing market for these high-value crops.<\/p>\n
PAO chief Emmanuel Caduyac, in an interview on Wednesday, encouraged farmers to plant coffee and cacao as there is a rising demand for these commodities.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are strengthening our campaign on coffee production due to a rise in coffee drinkers among the younger generations while the cacao industry is promising, so we need to improve production,\u201d Caduyac said.<\/p>\n
There is an increasing demand for cacao beans that are turned into chocolate drinks or chocolate candy bars by local suppliers, he added.<\/p>\n
The PAO is training farmers\u2019 associations on coffee and cacao production, processing, and propagation by agricultural technologists assigned in every municipality and city.<\/p>\n
These agricultural technologists handle at least five farmers\u2019 associations in their areas and distribute seeds and seedlings.<\/p>\n
Caduyac said coffee and cacao production expansion sites have already been identified across Negros Oriental.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, to help farmers recoup their losses from the recent El Ni\u00f1o-triggered drought, the PAO is also continuously distributing vegetable seeds, such as okra and eggplant, and fruit-bearing tree seedlings.<\/p>\n
He said these crops are weather-resistant and have better chances of surviving the La Ni\u00f1a towards the end of the year than rice and corn. (PNA)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
PAO in Negros Oriental advocates for wider cacao, coffee planting areas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":256263,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15011],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-256262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-greeninc"],"zyndk8_nxtgen_metadata":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/71"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=256262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256262\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/256263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=256262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=256262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatic-fuchsia-armadillo.46-250-226-234.cpanel.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=256262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}