Piddig town to revitalize carabao industry

Piddig, Ilocos Norte—Carabao, or water buffalo, was once a farmer’s best friend in Ilocos Norte. Farming families highly depended on it for draft. But as heavy infrastructure developments and agricultural modernization took place, the carabao industry has waned over the years.

In Piddig town, the local government unit here is trying to save water buffalo from extinction.

Recognizing its potential as a local source of milk and meat, Piddig mayor Georgina Salazar-Guillen believes the need to develop and conserve water buffalo production.

“We need carabaos, not just to help farmers to plow the land but they also give us milk and meat. They exist to balance our ecosystem,” Ms. Guillen said in an interview.

As baby steps to revive the industry, the Piddig local government moved to conduct an inventory of the remaining water buffalo in every rural village here.

Under the animal health program here, the local government unit will focus on the health welfare of water buffalo by ensuring that they get proper nutrition.

Based on the carabao situation report published by the Philippine Carabao Center in its website, the Philippine carabao has a total of 2.88 million heads as of July 1, 2017. Compared with the stocks of the same period in previous year, it decreased by 0.18 percent. Commercial stocks also decreased by 5.50 percent while inventory in backyard farms decreased by 0.16 percent.

Ms. Guillen also urged local farmers here to help in revitalizing the carabao industry and increase production.

Water buffaloes according to the PCC have inherently longer gestation period than any other domesticated farm animal. The average gestation length is 310 to 315 days.

Given a post-partum service period of 60 to 90 days, yearly production of calf is not achievable even under the best conditions. This characteristic has a major effect on the measure of the overall reproduction efficiency over a given period. (Leilanie G. Adriano)

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