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The Organic Coach

~ www.paulhenares.com

The Organic Coach

Monthly Archives: January 2011

Sangat Island : Jungle Farming in Coron

28 Friday Jan 2011

Posted by the organic coach in natural farming methods

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Coron, island farming, natural farming methods, natural farming systems, Palawan, Sangat Island, wreck diving

 

Coron Bay

Up in Northern Palawan is the Calamianes Group of Islands – 3 large islands with hundreds of mostly uninhabited outlying islands. Busuanga is the main island where the airport is located and where you find the rapidly growing town of Coron. There is also the island of Culion, which had traditionally been the trading center of the area in the early years. This is where the National Leprosarium Colony is located and they continue to have the best available medical facilties to this day. Then there is Coron Island, another large limestone island with inland lagoons, deserted beaches and beautiful dive spots.This is all part of the last frontier of Philippine tourism, Palawan.

Coron Pier

Coron brings about images of white sand beaches, world-class diving and awesome limestone cliffs. In fact, it is far from that, much in the same way as Caticlan is to Boracay. It was a small fishing town until the backpackers and divers discovered it in the 80’s. It is also surrounded by other large islands that make a little bay where ships would hide in bad weather. It also has a small port where passenger ships would pass on the way to Puerto Princesa, unload cargo and the few tourists that chose the rough way down to these islands. The attraction of Coron was, and still is, its world class diving sites. It is also one of the world’s ten top dive sites, largely due to the wrecks left in the aftermath of the Japanese retreat in World War II. People from around the world come to dive the waters around the Calamianes, swearing by its excellent wrecks and impeccable biodiversity. It is poised to become a major tourist destination of the Philippines and making a name for itself in the tourist world map.

My first visit to Coron was a trip to Sangat Island Dive Resort ( www.sangat.ph ), one of the more

Sangat Island Dive Resort

popular dive resorts in that area. Interestingly, like most Filipinos, I had never heard of this island resort before. It was first mentioned to me by a friend who happened to know the owner.  Having made a few farms already, I was fairly known around certain circles as the island farmer. Could I

Sangat Island

possibly make an organic farm in this island of 700 hectares, made up of mostly of limestone with a few hectares of jungle scattered around it? It meant carving a farm out of some forested areas surrounded by mangroves, to which the only access was through the sea. This was, quite literally, island farming. We found a reliable water source about 4 months later, in a cliff about 200 meters above the farm which was surrounded by limestone cliffs everywhere. We were also carving our farm out of this little jungle by clearing foliage, cutting branches and cleaning the area. From these clearings we made our vegetable plots, using the fertile clayish soil of the island. The Nightcrawlers came soon after that and we also started making our own liquid  fertilizers from kitchen waste. In an island of dive enthusiasts, I stuck out as an object of curiousity.  I was gathering sea weeds on the beach and moving them towards the farm. I was chopping fruit scraps, fish guts and seaweed for fermentation into natural fertilizers. While most of these were by now second nature to me, everyone in the island kept asking me about this “thing” I was doing. This thing called island farming.

Vegetable Plots from Cleared Forest Area

Sangat Island is an ecotourism destination. Started in the mid 80’s by a British treasure diver that had decided to marry a local lass, this resort was the closest to most of the wrecks in Coron Bay. It was, surprisingly, quite popular with foreign divers. People from all over the world practically came to the Philippines to go to this island and dive the wrecks around it. It is very native setting one sees in Sangat, houses are made of bamboo and topped with nipa roofing. In the evening, the staff would put mosquito nets on the beds to protect their guests. Electric power was only available from six in the evening till seven in the morning. There were clean bathrooms, a huge ceiling fan over the beds and not much else. No music system, no television and no power in daytime. The resort did have an internet point, the clubhouse where people would converge to avail of the solar powered batteries that charged phones, laptops and cameras while the generator kept silent. The feel of Sangat Island is very family-oriented. Everyone ate at set times of the day, sharing a common family style buffet setting at every meal. The employees were very friendly and casual, it would make anybody feel at home.

composting with nightcrawler worms

Just half a year of work in the jungle, we’ve carved out a little farm for the resort, producing a good percentage of vegetables it consumes. We’re slowly moving towards lettuce and high-value crops. We’re also looking at catching rain water to sustain the farm. Our little worms are doing wonders, producing fertilizer for us. The kitchen waste is also fermented to liquid stuff we feed our plants. Slowly but surely, working for a sustainable environment in the island.

In mid-December 2010, I was on my way to Coron from Sangat Island on the early morning boat that

vegetable plots

would bring tourists to town, to be picked up by a van that would bring us to Busuanga airport and back to civilization. While clicking on my camera during the trip, I noticed a big box of vegetables riding with us and got a big surprise. In it were cucumbers and lots of okra. “Why are we bringing vegetables to town?”, I asked the boatmen. “We need to sell them sir, we have too much of these we can’t consume all of it anymore!” was the reply. I gave them a big smile while I wanted to give my back a little pat for a job well done. Jungle farming in an island has its own simple rewards.

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Boracay Lives!

10 Monday Jan 2011

Posted by the organic coach in natural farming methods

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Boracay Chamber of Commerce and industry, Boracay Island, Canadian International Development Agency, solid waste management

White Beach, Boracay 1985

I have always loved island life for some reason. Since the first time I set foot on Boracay Island in 1985, I was hooked to it. Back then, we would travel 8 hours from Iloilo to come to this little piece of paradise, where fishermen would sell their catch to you at daybreak, cook it in the back kitchen and eat it for breakfast. In Balabag, where I stayed, there was one bar back then, the Beachcomber, which served cold beer and played music till the batteries would last. Yes, the car batteries that were running the sound system. There was no electricity in those days and the only way to move around was to walk the beach, there were just no roads too.

I kept coming back. And back. And back. Finally deciding to live there in 2004. I found work in the island, even an office with a view of the famous White Beach. I also lived by the beach, on a house on a cliff in Bolabog Beach, today known as the kitesurfing capital of Asia. I left Boracay to move back to Negros in 2007 but it remains a second home for me to this day.

Bulabog Beach, Boracay

It has all changed now, the island is the Philippines’ premier tourist destination today. It has hotels and resorts for every niche in the market. Restaurants with world-class cuisine, fastfood outlets and yes,  Starbucks on the beach. It is rated as one of the world’s top 10 beach destinations, famous for its nightlife as well as its pristine white sand. Surprisingly, It is also a showcase in ecological solid waste management  today.

Boracay Sunset

Back in 2005, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) gave a Two Million peso grant for a joint project with the Boracay Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCCI) which matched the grant with another Two Million Pesos. It’s goal was to address the solid waste management problem that Boracay was experiencing. A loose group of island businessmen and professionals, the BCCI embarked on this gigantic mission of initiating change in an island with 30,000 residents and over half a million visitors each year. In the hills behind the famous White Beach, the island had an open dump site  – its own version of Manila’s Smokey Mountain- that was the trash bin for all types of waste from the island. It was literally smoking as there was continuous burning of all types of garbage. There were a few scavengers as well, earning a living collecting plastic material and aluminum cans. It was an eyesore and a solid waste management nightmare. It was such a huge problem, nobody wanted to take the lead in looking for a solution. Nobody but BCCI and people who believed in their cause, that is.

White Beach, Boracay

In the summer of 2005, my island “gig” was managing a Mongolian barbecue restaurant within the D’Mall, the island’s main shopping area. It was an idea of a good friend of mine and I came in to manage the 20 seat restaurant as his partner. I only worked nights, which was perfect as it left me the whole day to enjoy the island life I had been living. It was huge success too, we had a grill on one of the alleys which smoked everyone passing by and smelling the various ingredients  we cooked. To my surprise, Mongolian barbecue actually traces its roots to the days of Genghis Khan. As nomad warriors, they would usually eat meat from animals they would slaughter each day, cooking them in their metal shields in a huge open fire pit where everyone would serve themselves. It was a great story I would tell to tourists who had never heard of this type of cuisine. It was fun work, had very little pressure and a great way to meet new people as well.

Working on White Beach 2005

I had previously worked with the BCCI as a freelance consultant, facilitating their strategic planning workshops and teambuilding sessions – skills i had learned as a corporate training executive. I was also closely working with their board, a group of idealistic people who were the island’s major stakeholders. Karen Villarica-Neff, their president then, sent me a message one night as I was tending to customers. We set a meeting for the next day and was asked, more like persuaded, to consider heading their solid waste management project for the next two years. It was quite a surprise to me, I knew absolutely nothing about solid waste management and had no qualifications in this field. But I had managerial and planning skills, was quite good with people and had the corporate experience they needed. I also needed a more stable job and here it was, being offered to me. Most of all, it looked like a great way to contribute something to this island I had grown to love as my second home.

Boracay Chamber of Commerce and Industry

“Boracay Lives” was the project I started to manage in April 2005. It’s aim was to initiate recycling, waste segregation at source and a more sustainable waste management for Boracay Island. It included building a Material Recovery Facility (actually something I had never heard of previously)  in the island, educating people on the benefits of proper waste management and creating a proper waste collection system. I soon moved into an office on White Beach itself, hired staff members and went about following a detailed list of activities according to a set timeline. We conducted seminars, met with government agencies, partnered with other organizations and always hoping to convince people to join our cause. In the meantime, I was also getting my own lessons in solid waste management. Mostly from the work we were doing and partly from my parents, both of whom had been involved in this field for a good number of years.

famous boracay sunset

It was a daunting challenge, to say the least. I had to present the project to various government officials, government agencies and civic organizations. We also had our share of disappointments with many government officials. But a lot of people were supportive and provided us the encouragement to keep on keeping on. The project found its champion in a barangay captain named Glenn Sacapano, who headed Barangay Balabag which covered most of White Beach. I had met this quiet and humble man in the many meetings we had and I somehow  placed my hope on him. According to the law we were trying to follow, the barangay chief was to be the point man. Our success was anchored on his own political will to institute change and implement the law – which he did effectively.  As we worked closely together, change slowly happened. The dump site was permanently closed, he passed an ordinance on waste segregation and implemented it himself. In the midst of controversy and criticism, our project constructed the first Material Recovery Facility in Boracay, built a composting facility for biodegradable waste, provided the first shredding machines and donated the first mini garbage truck to collect on White Beach itself. In the years that followed, government agencies and private organizations poured their resources into this little upstart project, expanding it and eventually creating a showcase for ecological solid waste management practices in the Philippines. People from all over the country continue to visit this facility today, learning what they can copy for their own cities and municipalities. In 2010, a select group of top local government officials from around the country gathered in Boracay for a National Solid Waste Management Summit, showcasing the Barangay Balabag experience and the system in place around the island today. Today, Barangay Balabag’s Material Recovery Facility produces and sells compost fertilizer, sells all the recyclables to wholesale buyers from Manila and operates a self sustainable waste management system which is supported by its own income from recyclable and biodegradable waste . It is supported by the Department of Tourism, the Boracay Foundation, the Aklan provincial government and the Municipality of Malay and many private corporations today.

segregated waste bins

I write this because I just got back from Boracay a few days ago. As I usually would, I spent New Year’s Eve with friends at the beach, partying island style. This year, I saw so many people I was very sure this was the most I had ever seen on the island. It was totally crowded on White Beach, I only managed to visit it a few times. Yet I was impressed with what I saw, the island was actually quite clean. There were posters everywhere reminding people about their waste, there were also uniformed personnel implementing ordinances. There is even a smoking, drinking and eating ban on the beach itself as an effort to rid the area of garbage. For a rapidly growing tourism destination, it is successfully coping with its waste management challenge while building on its past success. Today, Glenn Sacapano heads the Boracay Solid Waste Action Team – the island’s clean and green task force. He is still the quiet and assuming man he was, though now he is the champion of Boracay’s waste management initiative. And an excellent one as well.

In the final months of our project, towards the end of 2006, we decided to place a small plaque at their office for posterity. It was a simple memento for others to see in the years to come. Vaguely it reads, ” Barangay Balabag Material Recovery Facitlty, constructed in June 2006. A joint effort of the Pearl2 Project of the Canadian International Development Agency and the Boracay Chamber of Commerce and Industry.” Underneath was my name as Executive Director and the board members, most of whom truly deserve mention. Charles Y. Uy, Karen Villarica-Neff, Philippe Bartholomi, Peter Brugger, David Goldberg, Gigi Piit, John Munro and others I may not be able to recall. They know who they are. Boracay hardly remembers what these people did years ago, but I do. Back in the day, with our island in a crucial tipping point, these were the people who believed, who reached out for funds, who shared their resources and really worked hard for a cause they truly believed in. There is real power in having faith and pursuing one common purpose. What we believe, we can truly achieve. And as we had all believed back then, so we  see today…….Boracay Lives!

Boracay's famous White Beach

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