“Seed Sharing –Beautiful Sights, Beautiful Spirits All. Next Step – Science Sharing, Then Income-Building For All!

Never have I been more excited reading local farm news than “Seed Sharing And Storytelling, Highlighted During HVCDP Week“from the Cordilleras (Department of Agriculture-Cordillera, DA-CAR Press Release 25-76), written by Alyssa Dawn Alalag:

“As part of the High Value Crops Development Program (HVCDP) Week celebration, a heartfelt seed sharing activity brought together farmers, gardeners, and advocates of seed saving from various areas of the BLISTT (Baguio, La Trinidad, Itogon, Sablan, Tuba, and Tublay), Kapangan, Tabuk City and Pangasinan last April 8 at the DA-ATI CAR grounds.”

An Ilocano, from Asingan, Pangasinan, worried ahead about the coming more and more devastating typhoons brought about by Climate Change in turn brought about by Chemical Agriculture (CA), I am heartened that the spirit of sharing is alive and well in the boondocks!

Now then, I’m thinking ahead and applying the spirit of Seed Sharing to Science Sharing – formal/informal knowledge talks about what your neighbors have learned from other places but which may be applicable in your place.

Now at 85, I am too old to be an extension man, but there is the Internet and so I am encouraged! Seed sharing, enabled of course by seed saving, is a great tribal habit that should be adopted by modern farmers as may be encouraged and assisted by the DA.

Even before the time comes wqhen seed sharing has been well-adopted in the communities, even now the DA can introduce the seeds of knowledge for sharing – the new science of agriculture called Regenerative Agriculture (RA).

Why not Chemical Agriculture (CA)? Because, in fact, Climate Change can be traced back to modern CA that causes the generation of greenhouse gases (GHGs) that, as in a greenhouse, trap the heat from the Earth and throws it back – Climate Change!

Then we can engage in Science Sharing with these beautiful practices in Regenerative Agriculture (RA), each of which is VLC=VHR, that is, very low costs = very high returns!

(1) Cover (ropping,
(2) (rop Rotation,
(3) Farm (rops + Tree (rops (Agroforestry),
(4) Green Manuring,
(5) Inter(ropping,
(6) Multiple (ropping,
(7) No-Till Farming,
(8) Organi( Fertilization,
(9) Ratooning,
(10) Rotational Grazing,
(11) “Three Sisters” Planting,
(12) Trap (ropping, and
(13) Trash Mul(hing.

With science sharing, first in the Cordilleras, the region’s deep-rooted culture of solidarity and mutual support will not only continue but expand in meaning and relevance, towards the progress of the mountain people.

And if science is good for the mountain people, why not the lowland people?

“Seed sharing in the Cordilleras is more than just an agricultural activity, it is a reflection of the regions’s deep-rooted culture of solidarity and mutual support. This tradition, passed down through generations, emobodies the indigenous value of binnadang, a communal practice where neighbors help one another in times of need.”

Science sharing would then be an excellent ally, not simply a substitute, for agricultural extension in the highlands as well as the lowlands. Then farm science can enrich farmers both on the mountains and down there!@517