BAR TODAY || Official Quarterly Publication of the Bureau of Agricultural Research

NIRDEAP for Rubber: Stretching opportunities for rubber industry
by Thea Kristina M. Pabuayon

July-September 2001
Volume 3 No. 3

The Philippines has abundant natural resources but has been left behind by Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia in terms of its agricultural development. One of the main reasons for this is the country's apparent neglect of industrial crops like rubber.

First-class latex sheets are air-dried for export (Photo from Nick Gonzaga, taken from hi website "The Rubber Tree" at

Every year, the world rubber markets, particularly in USA, Europe, Japan, Australia, Korea, Germany and China, utilize 16.81 million metric tons (MMT) of rubber - 10.11 MMT of synthetic rubber and 6.70 MMT of natural rubber. The Philippines' share of this production remains very low.

In 1998, Philippine raw rubber export was 58, 317 tons valued at US$ 58.95 million. Although these figures have risen from previous year, it remains low compared to the production of other Asian countries, which accounts for 80% of the world's rubber. If developed, the local rubber industry can provide excellent export opportunities for footware, tires, tubes, retreads, and non-tire and non-footwear rubber goods. Aside from perking-up the economy, rubber farming is also a lucrative source of livelihood, providing the average farmers an annual income of P37, 500/ha. By farming at least three hectares per year, the average rubber farmer can earn P112, 500, a figure, which is 41.78% higher than the gross income of families in the poverty line.

For 2001, the Bureau of Agricultural Research released P1.69 million for the implementation of four projects under the National RDE Program for Rubber. For the next four years, BAR will release P4.76 million more to complete the projects' implementation. At present, the rubber industry is inhibited by three major problems: low productivity, lack of socio-economic data and market information systems, and inadequate RDE support. The National Integrated RDE Agenda and Program (NIRDEAP) for rubber aims to increase the production and income of farmers and planters through enhanced farm productivity and profitability, specifically from P37, 500/ha/yr to P44, 000/ha/yr for the first five years and P60, 000 in 15 years, with 0.8 tons/ha/yr to 1.5 tons/ha/yr in the first five years and 20 tons/ha/yr in 15 years. Moreover, the NIRDEAP contains provisions for the development of good quality raw/processed products, well-trained rubber stakeholders, and a systematic database that will give farmers and foreign buyers' access to scientific information, database and market information.

In the next five, years, the NIRDEAP will implement four major program areas, namely:

Varietal Improvement
Researchers will focus on developing five to ten high-yielding Latex Timber Clones (LTC). At present, researchers have already undertaken hybridization and clonal trial in rubber as well as collected 112 rubber clones, ten of which are recommended for wide cultivation. In terms of research gaps, R&D institutions have yet to characterize its germplsm collection and use market-assisted selection for faster and more efficient release of new LTC rubber.

Socio-economics and Marketing
The National Rubber network has already submitted a bill to congress for the creation of PhilRubber, an office that will focus on resolving key issues and problems plaguing the rubber industry. However, several concerns will still have to be resolved, including the updating of the socio-economic profile of the country's rubber farmers, assessment of the socio-economic impact of post-harvest rubber technologies, and the updating of data on market practices, cost and benefits from rubber, among others.

Farming System
Five years from now, the rubber network will have established, selected, and evaluated location-specific farming system under Philippine conditions. This will be done by undertaking on-farm demonstration of rubber-based farming systems, economic analysis of cover cropping, and related studies on alternate cover crops and main crop systems.

Crop Protection
This program area aims to identify and control major diseases and other maladies afflicting rubber. Past and current efforts in this field include the conduct of preliminary studies in controlling white rot disease in rubber, and the survey and identification of certain rubber disease, respectively.

(For more information, please contact Dr. Romulo Cena of the National Plantation Crops Network, University of Southern Mindanao, Kabacan, Cotabato or contact him at telephone number (064) 248-2323)