VALENCIA CITY (October 15) — Bukidnon ube farmers are set to gain a guaranteed buyer for their harvest under a P35-million, five-year partnership designed to produce 1.5 million kilograms of purple yam annually for processing and export to the United States.
The agreement, signed on October 5, brings together the Department of Agriculture (DA) Regional Field Office 10, private company Verueco Ventures Corp. (VVC), and two farmer associations at the Northern Mindanao Agricultural Crops and Livestock Research Complex.
The partnership aims to give farmers more than planting assistance by linking production directly to a buyer and an export-oriented processing operation. Under separate profit-sharing arrangements with VVC, the Lantapan Ube Planters Association and Balugto Hope Agroforestry Association Inc. will help supply high-quality ube for processing.
Harvested purple yam will be transported to Batangas, where it will be processed into powder before shipment to the US market.
VVC Treasurer Jan Romeo Verueco said the company saw strong potential for ube in international markets. The initiative will be its first project involving ube farmers.
For farmers accustomed to unpredictable vegetable prices and market oversupply, the prospect of having a buyer before planting could reduce the risk of unsold produce and wasted production costs.
“We are very grateful to be part of this [project] because this is the first time we have experienced planting with an assured buyer. In our previous experience growing vegetables, we faced many failures because there were times when the market became oversupplied,” said Junita D. Luminda of Balugto Hope.
Lantapan Ube Planters Association chairperson Roel Soria said access to financing would have limited value without a dependable market for farmers’ produce.
The DA committed to supporting production through soil testing, farm machinery, organic fertilizers, quality planting materials and regular field monitoring. These interventions are intended to improve productivity and promote sustainable farming practices.
MARKET ASSURANCE AND FARMER RETURNS
The partnership’s impact, however, will depend on whether the promised market delivers stable and fair returns to participating farmers over the five-year period.
A production target of 1.5 million kilograms annually will require reliable planting-material supplies, sustained technical assistance and clear arrangements for buying and transporting the harvest. The profit-sharing agreements will also be central to determining how much farmers ultimately earn after production costs.
The DA, VVC and the two farmer associations will need to ensure that the terms of the partnership are understood by participating growers and that buying arrangements remain dependable throughout the production cycle.
For Bukidnon’s ube farmers, the real measure of the P35-million investment will not be the volume produced alone, but whether the export venture gives farming households a more predictable livelihood and a fair share of the value created by their crop.
