Mini eco-park eyed as agri-tourism site

Cawitan is a small barangay in Sta. Catalina, Negros Oriental. With its rich soil, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) nurtured its potential for development and in just one year, the village now boasts of an eco-park with a vegetable garden and a tilapia fishpond.

Fifty-nine farmers and their families joined hands in creating the mini eco-park from a 500-square-meter previously idle land that belonged to the family of Mary Ann Valencia, the president of the Cawitan Maabtikon LAWA at BINHI Group. The Valencia family allowed the use of the land for free for the project under the DSWD’s LAWA (Local Adaptation to Water Access) and BINHI (Breaking Insufficiency through Nutritious Harvest for the Impoverished) program.

LAWA and BINHI capacitates communities to cope with impacts of climate change. For the Cawitan project, the beneficiaries underwent training on farming and aquaculture. They were also taught on project management and sustainability. Part of project strategy is that they build their own climate change-resilient agricultural projects.

“Before, this place is forested. When the project was given to us, we first built the fishpond. All 59 members of our group made the square pond for tilapia,” Valencia said in a video of the project posted on the DSWD Facebook page. “We need to have a water source for watering the farm so we built the fishpond.”

Just six months after the land was prepared and the fish pond was built, the group had already begun harvesting the fruits of their labor.

“We harvested tilapia and vegetables that we planted. We have many plants. We have almost all kinds of vegetables,” Valencia said.

From their earnings, the group further developed their vegetable garden and fishpond by constructing a comfort room and building a simple rest area, which they call their “resthouse.” The municipality is looking at making the project an agro-tourism site where visitors can fish in the pond and buy vegetables grown in the farm.

Sangguniang Bayan Committee on Tourism and Social Services head Herman Carballo said agritourism would give the local farmers additional income.