Potato growers/farmers in Mankayan, Benguet are now assured of a stable and accessible source of quality planting materials for a bountiful harvest.

The Mankayan Young Farmers Organization (MYFO), organized in November 2012, are composed of more than 40 members who were former agriculture trainees in Japan. With the learnings they have acquired on farm technologies, the Organization aims to increase agricultural livelihood that promotes easy and affordable farming system that can produce competent marketable products.

While the members of MYFO have long been engaged in vegetable production as their livelihood, the Organization opted for the establishment of a protected cultivation area to meet the emerging demands on high quality potato produce and restore the quality of marketable tubers and to provide affordable price of planting materials for farmers.

With interventions from the Department of Agriculture’s Philippine Rural Development Project (DA PRDP), the Organization is now assured of producing quality and marketable potato tubers using the greenhouse technology.

“The installation of these greenhouses will address the need for a steady and available source of potato planting materials which will benefit not only the members of the organization but more importantly, the other farmers in the community,” said Jovito Banglod, MYFO President.

Along with the greenhouses, the Organization will also receive 400 pots of potato mother plant, seedling trays, water tank, and power knapsack sprayer.

According to Banglod, the establishment of the greenhouses were completed in September 2018 after which the organization planted bell pepper and chinese cabbage since the potato mother plant is not yet delivered. In the meantime, the Organization will be producing other crops while waiting for the potato mother plants.

The subproject has a total cost of one million costly shared by the World Bank, the National Government through the DA, and the Provincial LGU of Benguet. The Organization provided a counterpart of more than 20% in the form of production labor and other existing materials.

With the full implementation of the enterprise, farmers can now be assured of a year-round disease resistant potato tubers thereby increasing their income by at least five percent in the implanting period. ### ELVY S. TAQUIO (DA PRDP RPCO-CAR InfoACE Unit)