Batac CITY—The dragon fruit production project of the Mariano
Marcos State University (MMSU) is proving itself as a very lucrative
agribusiness venture as shown by the figures obtained from the sales of the
fruit.
From
the 648 posts planted in three strategic sites in the main campus, the
university has already harvested about 700 kilos of fresh fruits from January
to July, which gave a little less than P70,000 gross.
“The
plants are still at their peak production period until September. That’s why we
expect to harvest more fruits in the next few weeks,” Jojo Battulayan, one of
the caretakers of the dragon plants said.
While
other dragon cactus growers in the province harvest the fruits of their crop
once a year within the July to September regular season, the university is
harvesting the fruits twice because of the application of the off-season
production technology for the crop.
Meanwhile,
Prof. Maura Luisa S. Gabriel, MMSU dragon fruit production project in-charge,
said there were other factors that hampered the smooth production of quality
fruits this year, but these were just minimal. She is referring to fruit flies
that destroy the emerging fruits. The pest buries its eggs in the fruit and the
larva will soon eat its way out, thus, making the fruit unmarketable.
“However,
we were able to address this problem through bagging,” she said.
Since
the Saniata variety of dragon cactus
has become a very profitable agribusiness venture in the university for the
last five years, the demand for the fruit starts ahead of the regular season,
thus, the university applies the off-season production technology to meet the
demand.
The
off-season production technology is applied in November when the plants receive
less amount of sunlight due to the effect of the incoming winter solstice—a situation
when the earth is at its farthest axis from the sun. During this period, the
dragon cactus cannot produce enough hormones to induce itself to flower. Thus,
the technology involves the use of 6-watt Light Emitting Diode (LED) bulbs, and
26-watt compact fluorescent lamps (CFL) which are used to light the plants
between 10:00 pm to 2:00 am.
The
demand for dragon fruit increases by more than two times higher in off-season
months than in regular season. In Ilocos Norte alone, market demand starts in
early parts of January.
In
most cases during regular and off-season months, harvesting dragon fruits in
the university is done by order due to limited supply. Usually, the harvest is
done twice a week with a minimum of 80 kilos per harvest.
The
selling price per kilo depends on the season and the volume of harvest. From
January to March, the fruit is sold at P150 to P180 per kilo, while it dips to
P75 to P80 per kilo from July to September. Some growers in the province even
disastrously compete with other farmers by lowering it to P50 to P60 per kilo.
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