balita-dot-ph
April 21,2010 8:09 PM

Agriculture office promoting dragon fruit growing

DUMAGUETE CITY, April 21 – The Provincial Agriculture of Negros Oriental is now propagating seedlings of Pitaya, commonly known as dragon fruit.

According to Provincial Agriculturist Gregorio Paltinca, they have decided to propagate around a thousand seedlings of dragon fruit after they noticed the huge market demand in Cebu and other neighboring provinces.
Aside from the local market, there is also an available demand for a bigger volume of dragon fruit that will be exported as main ingredient for juices, ice cream, jam and other processed fruit products.

He said dragon fruit belongs to the cactus family that can perfectly grow and be produced in tropical countries.
According to studies, the dragon fruit sits on the cactus-like trees 30–50 days after flowering and can sometimes have five to six cycles of harvests per year. There are some farms in other tropical countries that produce 30 tons of fruit per hectare every year.

The said plant can flower between three and six times in a year depending on growing conditions.
Paltinca added the dragon seedlings were from the Ferrolino Farm in the town of San Jose which is also one of the demonstration farms of the Provincial Agriculture Office.

Paltinca said majority of the people in Negros Oriental still do not recognize dragon fruit since only a few farmers are growing it.

During the last Christmas season, some supermarkets sold dragon fruit at P200 per kilo. (PNA) LAP/jfp/Maricar Aranas

Source: http://balita.ph/2010/04/21/agriculture-office-promoting-dragon-fruit-growing/