Fighting CSI

It’s time the government devoted appropriate attention, and funding, to efforts to halt the spread of the coconut scale insects (CSI)—aka “cocolisap”—now laying waste to coconut trees in the Calabarzon region.

The CSI infestation is particularly worrisome in a country where so much is dependent on the coconut industry. According to the 2013 industry outlook released by the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA), 3.5 million farmers work in coconut farms and a total of 25 million Filipinos are either directly or indirectly dependent on coconuts. As many as 3.1 million hectares are planted to coconuts, and the Philippines provides a whopping 59 percent of the world’s exported coconut products. The stakes have literally never been higher.

The United Coconut Association of the Philippines (Ucap) says the combination of the CSI infestation and the damage wrought when Supertyphoon “Yolanda” struck late last year has brought the coconut industry to a standstill. Ucap says that in April, the monthly volume of coconut exports fell by 25 percent, and it has been falling for seven straight months. The export of copra has stopped completely for four months. Across the board, all the export numbers are down.

Meanwhile, the government is being criticized for its delayed response to the “cocolisap” problem. Agham, a group of concerned scientists, characterized the government response as merely “palliative” and five years too late.

Farmers’ groups and other concerned organizations are in conflict over what steps to take to fight the outbreak. The conflict is classic: organic versus chemical? The former is ideal, as Greenpeace and some local farmers’ groups contend. But the chemical solution is swift and intensive, contend other groups.

Scientist Emil Javier wrote in a commentary published yesterday (Saturday) in the Inquirer that the key to fighting the CSI infestation is to stop its spread so as to allow the pests’ natural predators time to multiply. “The CSI outbreak need not be the end of our coconut industry,” he wrote, adding: “[T]he government can take vigorous measures to arrest/contain the spread of CSI, with chemical, organic and botanical pesticides, as appropriate. The research agencies should ramp up their scientific work to identify the most effective natural enemies of CSI, facilitate their mass rearing, and determine their most cost-effective deployment.”

The PCA had initially intended to use pesticides belonging to the family of neonicotinoids to fight the infestation, but Greenpeace protested this and coconut farmers warned that they would not allow the injection of the chemicals into their trees. Citing a report from the Worldwide Integrated Assessment (WIA) of the Task Force on Systemic Pesticides of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, Greenpeace Philippines campaigner Daniel Ocampo said the WIA’s findings “are gravely worrying, especially in the light of the active promotion of neonicotinoids by the PCA and the Department of Agriculture to address the ‘cocolisap’ [outbreak].” Farmer leader Romeo Clavo pointed out: “The coconut is our only means of livelihood. We won’t let the government use it in its trial-and-error approach to combat the pest.”

But researcher Celia Medina of the University of the Philippines Los Baños Crop Protection Cluster said that in using neonicotinoids, “the probability of risk to humans and the environment is almost nil.”

Last week, the Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority approved CropGuard, an all-organic, locally developed spray, after the conduct of tests in Calabarzon and Basilan.

It’s imperative that government leaders and coconut-industry stakeholders discuss the matter together and agree to solutions that can be swiftly implemented. With the common goal so clear, the pooled efforts of the public and private sectors should make up a strong defense to this massive threat to the coconut industry.

“But most importantly,” Javier also wrote, “the Philippine Coconut Authority, Department of Agriculture, local government units, and state colleges and universities should launch a massive coconut replanting and intercropping program to raise total farm productivity, generate additional employment, and raise the income of coconut farmers.”