PNP SEES END TO MARIJUANA TRADE

Yacon Introduced To Cordillera Farmers As Replacement Crop

KAPANGAN, Benguet - Philippine National Police Chief Director-General
Arturo C. Lumibao, predicted here an end to the marijuana cultivation
in the Cordillera Region with the full-scale implementation of the
yacon-growing project.

Speaking before more than 40 participants in a seminar on
yacon-cultivation, the PNP chief believed that the yacon project
launched by the Police Regional Office-Cordillera Administrative
Region (PRO-COR) to stop the growing of the prohibited plant is in
line with the government's program aimed at providing livelihood to
people in the rural areas.

The yacon-cultivation is also aimed at curbing the century-old
marijuana production in the various parts of Cordillera.

Marijuana cultivation has become the main source of livelihood of many
residents of farflung barangays of Benguet, Mountain Province, and
Kalinga.

Lumibao lauded Kapangan officials for spearheading the yacon project
as well as the cultivation of anthorium, noting that they took the
initiative to provide alternative sources of livelihood for their
constituents.

Yacon is a tasty, potato-like root crop with medicinal properties that
could lower the blood sugar level of people with diabetes and could
improve digestion.

The farmers who participated in the yacon-cultivation seminar came
form areas where there were marijuana plantations that were destroyed
by government operatives.

Chief Supt. Leonardo Dionisio, PRO-COR director, was about to sign an
agreement on yacon juice and tea processing or manufacturing with
concerned government agencies.

The project aims to determine the most appropriate method of
processing and manufacturing yacon tea and yacon juice with no
additives, two health products that are popular in Japan and other
countries because of their fructooligoseccherides, which increases
probiotic bacteria in the intestines and polyphenol, which has an
anti-oxidant effect.

Dionisio said the yacon juice and tea-processing or manufacturing can
contribute to the eradication, of the marijuana menace in the Cordillera.

PRO COR will implement its Oplan Yacon, which is geared at promoting
and enhancing yacon propagation as the main source of livelihood of
farmers who used to be engaged in marijuana cultivation.

One of the strategies embodied in the medium-term, anti-illegal drug
master plan of the PNP calls the eradication of marijuana plantations
through the introduction of alternative crops to serve as the source
of livelihood of marijuana cultivators.