Ilocos Norte mango growers to start all over again

By Leilanie G. Adriano

Staff reporter

LAOAG CITY—Supertyphoon “Lawin” [international name Haima] barreled through Ilocos region last month, and among those battered were mango trees that were due for harvest this month.

Ricardo Tolentino, popularly known as Ilocos Norte’s “mango king” reported the mango growers’ association here were totally devastated seeing their mango trees swayed by strong winds, fallen branches and some were even uprooted at the height of the typhoon.

The Ilocos region which includes the provinces of Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, La Union and Pangasinan is one of the country’s major exporter of quality mangoes to Hong Kong, Japan and other neighboring Southeast Asian nations.

According to Mr. Tolentino, the estimated damages could account to more than ₱100 million as most of the growers heavily invested this year on power spray and in rehabilitation their mango trees.

As a high value commercial crop in the province, the provincial government continues to provide funding support in the form of fertilizer subsidy and training for mango growers to rehabilitate mango fruit plantations here.

Since 2012, mango farms have been suffering from low yield due to erratic weather patterns.

Because of this, mango growers were discouraged to spray their trees anymore because of the low fruit production the previous years.

Mango spraying using chemicals such as potassium nitrate has become effective in inducing the trees to produce more flowers uniformly in contrast to the traditional “smoking” technique.

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