By MELPHA M. ABELLO

March 17, 2012, 11:12am

MANILA, Philippines — Alfredo Alog of Angadanan, Isabela has realized that there is more income from planting saba banana than any other crops he has planted.

Alfredo plants saba as a shade crop for his Excelsa coffee trees planted in his one-hectare farm. “Without partial shade, my coffee trees would die,” he said.

The good thing about saba, Alfredo said, is that it is a year-round crop and harvesting is done weekly once the plants reach bearing stage. This is more advantageous compared to coffee which fruits only once a year, he said. Besides, he sees the increasing demand for saba makes it an ideal crop to grow.

Alfredo plants what he calls the “Dalian” variety of saba which bears fruits as early as 12 months after planting - six months earlier than the traditional saba which bears fruits in 18 months from planting. He pre-fers Dalian which he obtained from Davao during a field visit a few years ago because he can harvest earlier.

According to Dr. Biley Temanel, a banana expert from Isabela State University, early-maturing banana offers more advantage to banana farmers in Cagayan Valley as the region is prone to typhoons. This variety also allows a short-period of recovery of investment, which is estimated at P86,000 per hectare during the first year.

As an appointed farmer scientist of the Cagayan Valley Agriculture and Resources Research and De-velopment (CVARRD) Consortium, Alfredo adopts improved cultural management practices in saba production in his science and technology-based farm in Angadanan. These were included in the package of technology for saba which he developed in partnership with Dr. Biley Temanel and Dr. Florenda Temanel of ISU.

Particularly notable about Alfredo’s practices include the use of tissue-cultured seedlings which is a cost-effective option to achieve true-to-type and disease-free banana plants. Other practices are the application of organic matter in combination with inorganic fertilizers, and observance of practices such as weeding, desuckering, stem and mat sanitation, debudding, and fruit labeling.

Alfredo observes that when applied with organic fertilizers, saba is resistant to diseases. He applies cattle manure, carbonized rice hull and indigenous microorganisms or IMO in layers during land preparation.

The package of technology suggests that at a planting distance of 4 m x 4 m, the population will be 625 plants per hectare.

With his practices, Alfredo can produce good-quality saba fruits that weigh 30 kilograms per bunch. At P18 per kg ex-farm, he can earn a gross income of up to P300,000 per hectare of saba in one year.

Alfredo is just one of the 25 farmer cooperators in Isabela who are adopting scientific methods of producing saba. These cooperators cultivate a combined area of 25 hectares, which is 0.1 percent of the 25,000-hectare total saba area in the province.

Saba, a cooking type of banana, is one of the main sources of income especially for smallhold farmers in Isabela, which is the leading producer of banana in Cagayan Valley. Together with lakatan, latundan and bongulan, saba is identified as among commodities included in the S & T Agenda of CVARRD and one of the priorities in the National Banana RDE Program. This resulted in the increased consciousness on banana production and the adoption of technologies and practices.

Aside from the fruits, the cooperators are also into clean sucker production which they retail to planters at P25 each.