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Research breakthrough in abaca being stymied by a clueless bureaucrat

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After close to sixty years of effort, involving three generations of scientists, we are finally close to offering relief to our beleaguered abaca farmers who had been suffering heavy losses due to virus diseases, particularly the dreaded bunchy-top virus.

After close to sixty years of effort, involving three generations of scientists, we are finally close to offering relief to our beleaguered abaca farmers who had been suffering heavy losses due to virus diseases, particularly the dreaded bunchy-top virus.

However instead of welcoming the development, a clueless bureaucrat in the Department of Agriculture has demanded a halt of the multi-location field trials of the bunchy-top resistant hybrids developed by the Institute of Plant Breeding (IPB) at UP Los Baos (UPLB) and funded by the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST-PCAARRD). Multi-location trials are necessary steps to establish whether the claimed traits of good adaptation, high yields and resistance to disease are attained when candidate varieties are grown under diverse, actual farming conditions.

The same officer has likewise demanded that a 10-hectare field trial in Leyte jointly launched by Specialty Pulp Manufacturing Inc. (SPMI) and the National Abaca Research Center in Visayas State University be terminated. This joint public-private undertaking which is independent of the plant breeding institution to ensure objectivity, was designed to gather conclusive data on the suitability of the new hybrids for commercial propagation for paper and pulp which are now the dominant uses of abaca fiber (not so much as cordage, anymore).

 

See full article at Manila Bulletin

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