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| File photo of Mango King Carding Tolentino showing the Ilocos mangoes. |
By Leilanie G. Adriano
Staff reporter
MARCOS, Ilocos Norte—The local chief executive of this town plans
to revive a mango processing plant here as he tries to encourage more investors
to take advantage of the favorable economic activity in this northern part of
Luzon.
Marcos Mayor Arsenio Agustin
said they had already sought the help of the national government and the Ilocos
Norte Electric Cooperative (INEC) to assess the facility and to estimate amount
needed to revive the mango processing plant here located at the Marcos
Agro-industrial school.
In 2007, then Ilocos Norte
governor now Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” R. Marcos Jr. led the inauguration of
the said building under the watch of the Technical Education Skills and
Development Authority (TESDA).
According to Mr. Agustin,
they plan to expand mango plantations in Marcos town by encouraging more farmers
to plant mango seedlings and make this high value fruit as the municipality’s
one town-one product.
To spur economic development
in the Ilocos region, it may be recalled that a group of Filipino
investors from Hawaii established a multi-million mango processing plant in
Barangay Sulbec, Pasuquin, Ilocos Norte in early 2006 but this did not last
long due to lack of available raw materials for export.
The Pasuquin-based mango
processing plant has a capacity of 10 tons in a 24-hour operation, catering to
an estimated 250 hectares of full-grown mango plantations in the province.
Products from the processing plant include mango puree, sweetened candies and
others, exported mainly in Hawaii as well as other parts of the country.
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