From a modest mind

Farmers brace for a dry spell as their rice fields start to dry up with the ground already showing some cracks. They already expressed alarm when grassfires erupted because of the extreme heat as it sets the palay on fire. The rivers and deep wells have also started drying up. Palay were reduced to ashes because they relied only on rainfall as source of water. The scenario would last for about months. This is already considered loss as they have no way to recover the considerable amount of capital invested on the farm inputs for this season. A season when water is remarkably scarce.

Water is a necessary input to farming. During dry season, farmers have limited options to plant crops. And so they have to consider heat resistant crops. With extreme heat especially when El Niño comes, it is indeed a problem for them. But water is not anymore a predicament in farming when farmers can use what our country is blessed so vastly-seawater.

A great number of our Filipino brothers rely on fishing and farming. These two provide the very staple for every Filipino table. In farming, water as a major element, together with other inputs, produces high yield crops. But the irrigation system in the Philippines remains a much-desired component in the agriculture sector. Such problem is exacerbated during dry season plus the El Niño phenomenon has all the more added a big cross to our local farmers.

An archipelagic country surrounded with seawater, a great number of our Filipino brothers rely on the abundant resources from the sea. Long before, we have not tapped heavily the contribution of our seawater to farming. Our great ancestors have long been perceptive to what was going on in the environment. Specifically as to the best season for planting, the type of soil that a plant would best thrive and many others. Not probably this time that a scientific undertaking has validated nature's works, including seawater being a great factor to increase production in farming.

Such scientific discovery was a product of one's need and the curiosity of what's happening in the environment. Yes it took a lady farmer to understand the workings of the environment and related it to the very need for survival and improvement. Cirila Cuyacot from Ubay, Bohol is armed with the curiosity and a simple understanding of the environment.

In a coastal town, she observed that if coconuts thrive so close to the sea, why not try seawater's effect on some peanuts? She mixed seawater and freshwater, used it to water her peanuts and observed a 50 percent increase in yield! Farmer scientist Cuyacot started it all as a participant in the Farmer Scientist Training Program (FSTP) in 1994 of Dr. Romulo Davide, a UP Los Baños professor emeritus and also a Cebuano farmer scientist.

When the supply of water is at critical level, such discovery of using seawater for irrigation is of great help. It took a simple farmer to think of such a brilliant answer to a pressing problem of water supply. Cuyacot may just be a simple farmer from a not so known place but she has provided a solution to the perennial problem of water shortage.

When farm lands are drying up, the solution is here. A solution that is just within our midst. Our vast sea resource has offered us remedy to increase production in agriculture.

Such effort needs duplication in all areas where farming contributes largely to the economic development. Government must heed to the call of time by acting conscientiously and sustain such effort to cushion the negative impact brought about if similar problem may happen in the future. Government support is highly desired as this hopefully can be replicated all throughout the country. Technical support in irrigation mechanism that would make seawater available to the farming areas is much needed.

From an unassuming mind comes a great idea that would answer the effects of harsh condition and unstable food production. It is a discovery that is driven to uplift one's living condition and to help others. This is a triumph of raw determination and tireless diligence.