50 years of an agricultural college

Fifty years ago, in 1953, Father William Masterson S.J. (who had just stepped down as Rector of the Ateneo de Manila and had been reassigned to a much smaller school, the Ateneo de Cagayan) decided to start a school of agriculture. It started in a very small way and with much hardship. There were only a few students; the facilities and equipment were skimpy; the land for cultivation had no source of water. Water had to be brought up in cans, and later pumped up from the river many hundred feet below.

While the school was tiny, the idea behind it was large. It was a small step as a contribution to national development based on very high ideals of social justice.

Masterson (an American from a well-to-do family in a large city – his father was a physician) had spent three years as a young scholastic teaching at the Ateneo de Manila and there he came under the influence of Father Joseph Mulry. Mulry had a fiery enthusiasm for social justice – urban and agrarian – based on Christian principles expounded in Papal encyclicals. Mulry’s enthusiasm was contagious, and Masterson was one of those who caught it.

Both Mulry and Masterson were convinced that reforms and national development can be promoted only by persons who combined professional expertise (in various fields) with a deep commitment to solid Christian social principles. Hence that tiny school of agriculture in Cagayan.

That tiny school of 1953 has now grown into a large complex. Besides the basic programs in agronomy and animal husbandry, the College of Agriculture of Xavier University has programs in agricultural engineering, food technology, and development communication arts.

In addition, it has adjunct service units: An Appropriate Technology Center; a Sustainable Agriculture Center; a Non-Conventional Energy Center; a Farmers’ Information Center.

Almost from the start, the Xavier University College of Agriculture has maintained an Extension Service Agriculturists are deployed to rural areas in Bukidnon, Zamboanga del Sur, and other provinces, to help local farmers make better use of their land.

The most innovative of Father Masterson’s initiatives is SEARSOLIN (South East Asia Rural Social Leadership Institute) now in its third decade of existence. Originally intended to train social leaders from Southeast Asia (Indonesia, Malaysia, Viet Nam, Laos, Cambodia, Taiwan) it was later widened to include those from mainland China, Korea, Africa and Oceania.

In its first 30 years SEARSOLIN was funded by MISEREOR, a charitable agency of the German Bishops. That funding has now stopped and SEARSOLIN is looking for new sources of funding to allow it to continue its work.

If you have millions (or thousands) and want to use them constructively, you might consider Xavier University’s SEARSOLIN.