Cagayan boosts seaweed production

WITH the sharp decline in seaweed production in Cagayan Valley (Region 2) in the past years, a group of fisher folk in Buguey town in Cagayan province has spearheaded the revival of the locality’s seaweed industry.

Judimar Taloza, president of the Calamegatan Fisherfolk Association, said his group has started planting seaweeds in February this year and started harvesting in April. Harvesting will continue until August this year.

Taloza added his group held a harvest field day last May 29 highlighting a bountiful harvest of seaweed in Barangay Calamegatan in Buguey town.

The field day was spearheaded by the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR)- Cagayan Valley in collaboration with the municipal government of Buguey, and attended by seaweed action officers from the Ilocos region, Central Luzon, Calabarzon, Western Visayas, and the Bicol region, and representatives from local seaweed growers and the Seaweed Industry Association of the Philippines led by its president Alfredo Pedrosa.

In Calamegatan village, harvested glacilaria seaweeds are usually dried and sold to a consolidator at P10 per kilo, representing added income for fisher folk.

Locally, seaweed is sold fresh as food and used as ingredient in a number of seaweed- enhanced products like miki, canton, chips, and pickles. It is a source of agar used in a number of food, non-food, and industrial applications or as feed for farmed fish particularly siganids, also known as malaga.

Severina Bueno, chief of the Fisheries Production Division of BFAR- Cagayan Valley, said there was a sharp decline in seaweed production in Cagayan Valley because of environmental factors.

“These environmental constraints have also been aggravated by the lack of policy governing the exploitation of seaweed resource,” she added.

To help address the decline of the seaweeds reserve in the region, BFAR- Cagayan Valley has targeted the establishment and maintenance of nurseries and grow- out technodemo projects.

“The bureau needs to maintain its success in introducing gracilaria culture in non- traditional sites particularly in the towns of Claveria, Sanchez Mira, Gonzaga, and Santa Teresita in Cagayan province,” Bueno said.

She said those who attended the harvest day also agreed to provide

banca (amphibian type) for harvesting, form cooperatives among seaweed farmers and gatherers and fish cage operators, conduct training for proper handling, and provide other seaweed growing paraphernalia.