| A
recent breakthrough in the culture of citrus could possibly
speed up the growth of local orange and pomelo production
and establish itself as one of the country's top dollar
earners.
Citrus
production has lately failed to bloom at a time when it was
expected to pick up for lack of sufficient quality and
certified seedlings and an apparent lack of government
support. Worse, the government's relaxation on fruits'
importation has dealt the final death blow on local
entrepreneurs.
Bernardo O. Dizon top
notch agriculturist and leading expert on grape and citrus
culture in the country, disclosed that his more than 20
years of painstaking research and experimentation has
produced seedlings from imported grapes, oranges and pomelos
that are of tremendous economic value. The plant's fruit
bearing periods have been drastically cut to almost half the
time of their regular fruiting season. His oranges and
pomelo seedlings bear fruits in a year and a half only
compared to three or four years under ordinary propagation
and planting technique.
Dizon said that to encourage plantation owners and
backyard growers, quality seedlings should be provided them
at a very low cost.
Technically, there is no deep secret to this technique.
The method of propagation utilizes actual field condition
and is done with the inarching, budding and grafting of
seedlings grown in triple rootstocks. The native pomelo and
calamandarin are used as complementary rootstocks.
Dizon said the use of the method of double rootstock in
the propagation of citrus especially in oranges and pomelos
induce the plants to mature early, bear more fruits and to
withstand heavy windstorm.
Dizon disclosed that his method could produce one
million seedlings within three years from a single plant. In
five years, he said, from a a single plant can be replicated
10 billion seedlings. At an average yield of 50 kilos, total
yield amount to some 500 billion kilos of oranges or pomelos
which are sufficient enough to satisfy domestic as well as
export demands.
Under ordinary propagation, asexual seedling
reproduction stars only after two years from date of
planting. Such process may produce only a few hundred
seedlings, compared to Dizon's millions Tissue culture is
considered expensive, highly technical, risky and entails a
longer waiting period and only done in a laboratory.
Dizon said he is willing to undertake mass production
of high-grade seedlings for the government and private
concerns upon request. It was learned that Dizon's 300
square meter plot at the University of the Philippines'
Bliss Economic Garden in Quezon City could produce only a
very limited amount of seedlings.
Dizon's research center has the best variety of pomelos
and oranges, such as Davao Pink and Thailand Sungsung
pomelos, Satsuma, Navel and Pineapple oranges. |
