A GIANT bamboo nursery will soon rise in Zamboanga City in a bid to meet the rising demand of bamboo seedlings in the area.

This is all thanks to stakeholders and key players who continuously work together to develop the country’s bamboo industry.

The Confederation of Western Mindanao Philippine Exporters Confederation Inc. (Philexport WesMin Phils.) headed by its president, Engr. Jaydrick Johnson Yap, and Zamboanga Bamboo Development Council Inc. (ZBDCI) President George Madrazo, will formally sign next month a memorandum of agreement on the operation of the proposed giant bamboo nursery.

The nursery and purchase of giant bamboo seedlings project aims to provide local farmers with the readily available seedlings in the area, and a sufficient supply of bamboo raw materials for various industries and end-products.

Philexport WesMin Phils. will fund the construction of the nursery structure and provide an initial 2,500 giant bamboo seedlings.

“We will start [the construction] by the last week of May 2022; it will take at least two weeks. [This will be] funded through our Philexport regional/sectoral support fund of 2021. It (nursery) will be our showroom for interested buyers/farmers,” said Philexport WesMin Phils. Executive Director Ross Alfred Estrada.

The ZBDCI will manage the bamboo nursery located at MelRoseVille Subdivision in Divisoria for establishing seedlings nursery that will provide the seedlings to its member-farmers, people’s organization, and LGUs in Zamboanga Peninsula. It will be responsible for the nursery’s daily operation and expenditures.

The ZBDCI and Philexport WesMin Phils. have agreed to a 50-50-percent sharing of the total net income of the nursery.

Estrada said they target to cater the entire Zamboanga Peninsula and different chapters of Philexport.

“This will be a prototype giant bamboo nursery and it can be duplicated to other chapters. Bamboo is a diverse product for the environment and a sustainable material for the replacement of timbers for construction used as engineered bamboo, furniture, processed bamboo shoot, etc. It’s a huge export product industry in the future,” he said.

Estrada said they will start locally by giving livelihood to the community.

“We have local post–harvest facilities in Bukidnon who already supplied and exported the engineered bamboo planks to Vietnam and the United States,” he added.