Amid rice crisis, try bananas

SAN JUAN, Ilocos Sur — Try cooked saba (a type of banana) and adobo for lunch, and again with caldereta for dinner, instead of rice, just as many Africans do.

Dr. Agustin Molina, regional coordinator for Asia and the Pacific of the Rome-based Biodiversity International, said bananas, unlike rice, can be grown anywhere and any time of the year.

Speaking before a group of tobacco farmers at the province-owned Barang-ay farm here, Molina said saba or cardaba bananas are starchy and good substitutes for rice.

“In Uganda, bananas are the major staple food,” he said.

Molina, a native of Santa, Ilocos Sur, said bananas can be grown on hillsides or marginal lands “and even in backyards” because they are  “drought-resistant.”

“Don’t worry when dry weather sets in and your banana crop is still growing. Don’t panic because it is drought-resistant,” he told the farmers in Ilocano.

Molina was tapped by Carlitos Encarnacion, administrator of the National Tobacco Administration (NTA), to extend technical assistance to the agency’s banana production project, which aims to provide additional income to tobacco farmers.

NTA has so far distributed 3,750 saba seedlings to tobacco farmers since the project started last Jan. 29.

Ilocos Sur Gov. Deogracias Victor Savellano joined Encarnacion and Molina in distributing 550 saba seedlings to 80 farmers from Cabugao and Sinait towns after a short program at the Barang-ay farm in Barangay Labnig last Friday.

The saba produce of farmers will be processed into banana chips at the provincial government-owned PGMA-Multiline Food processing plant, which is being operated and managed by NTA.

Encarnacion said there is a big demand for banana chips in China, Japan and other Asian countries.  

He has placed food production as a priority program of his administration, Savellano said.

Molina said bananas popular in Uganda and other east African countries are called “plantain” or cooking bananas.

Plantain is carbohydrate-rich like the saba, which is also called “dippig” in the Ilocos region, he added.

To supplement dippig or saba, Molina said he plans to introduce FHIA 21 variety, a plantain-type banana common in the Ilocos provinces.

Apart from carbohydrates, these types of bananas are also rich in vitamins, he added.    

Dr. Felipe de la Cruz Jr. of the University of the Philippines-Los Baños Institute of Plant Breeding, who accompanied Molina, told the farmers that the ideal start of planting saba would be during the rainy season.

“By the time dry weather sets in, the plants would be well-grounded and prepared for the drought-season,” he said.