The Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) has partnered with private sector partners to set up a state-of-the-art nursery and soils laboratory in Northern Negros as part of measures to boost productivity and support cane farmers.
The SRA said yesterday that the agency signed a joint memorandum of agreement with the Victorias Milling Co. Inc. (VMC), the Victorias Mill District Development Council and the Florencia Workers Association on Oct. 7 to put up a high-yielding variety nursery and soils laboratory in Victorias City.
The agency said the facility would serve as a regional hub for developing resilient, high-yield cane varieties and advancing soil management practices.
‘This is about mutual growth. When farmers succeed, so does the mill,’ SRA board member David Andrew Sanson said in a statement.
SRA administrator Pablo Luis Azcona said the initiative will boost productivity and support farmers by providing access to scientific tools and knowledge previously concentrated at the agency’s main research center in La Carlota.
VMC president Linley Retirado expressed optimism that the partnership would revive the mill’s historical role in providing fertilizers, technical assistance and farm management guidance to planters that stopped in 1997.
The SRA said the nursery and lab are set to start operations this crop year, promoting the propagation of higher yielding cane varieties and offering scientific soil analysis to support evidence-based farming.
Edward Sarrosa, president of the Rural Sugar Planters Association, said the project was long awaited, and credited the SRA for extending services from La Granja to Northern Negros.
The SRA said the success of the facility would depend on close cooperation among public and private partners, local governments and farmers’ groups to ensure that research and resources directly address the needs of the community.