Cabingtan

Visit to farmer trialling protected cropping systems at Cabingtan, in the mountains behind Ormoc City.

The structures are built from bamboo and timber and covered in plastic and held down by fishing net. The winds up here are very strong and the area is often badly affected by typhoons. Normally tomatoes only grow about 60cm high; you can see that these are a lot higher than that. Noel, the farmer, is also trialling soil testing to control the amount of fertiliser he uses. He has reduced the amount of fertiser needed significantly without affecting the quality of the plants. Normally fertiliser is leached from the soil by the heavy rain,which falls frequently. The structures also help to reduce pests, such as the long nosed beetle, which we found in the conventional control area.

Noel is also helping local farmers with structures. One is using rejected steel water pipe to build his structures.