The approval for the commercial planting of the varieties was given by the National Seed Industry Council (NSIC), the government body under the Departent of Agriculture tasked with helping develop the country’s seed industry.
The NSIC also approved the use of the fruit crop varieties as sources of scion for the commercial production of planting materials.
Dr. Roberto E. Coronel, professor emeritus of UP Los Baños and chair of the NSIC Fruit Crops Technical Working Group, said the varieties were evaluated by teams before their recommendation.
The citrus varieties are the Gayunan mandarin, Magallanes pummelo, Ponkan (California) mandarin, and Ponkan (Taiwan) mandarin.
The Gayunan mandarin was propagated from a seed taken from Pasil, Kalinga. The three others were propagated from buds taken from Davao and other countries.
All the citrus varieties are found at the Bureau of Plant Industry-Baguio National Crops Research and Development Center (BPI-BNCRDC) in Baguio City. Dr. Juliet Ochasan, a BPI fruit crops expert, evaluated them all.
The new mango varieties are the Tanaleon mango, owned by Dominador Tanaleon at Barangay Aguilar, San Lorenzo, Guimaras; and Guimaras Super (Galila) owned by Cesar Galila in Barangay Poblacion, Nueva Valencia.
Both mango varieties were evaluated by Sofia Covacha and Edrie Gaitan of the BPI-National Mango Research and Development Center (NMRDC) in Jordan, Guimaras. – RAF