Maasin City (March 7) --- At least 12 municipalities and 1 city in Southern Leyte started using the Modified Rice Composting introduced by the Office of the Provincial Agriculture (OPAg) here, Norberto Tagana, OPAg Supervising Agriculturist reported this morning.

The program, one of the priority projects of the Arroyo administration was introduced last year to encourage farmers not to burn rice straws but instead use them as organic fertilizers to replace commercial fertilizers like urea, a white crystalline solid containing 46% nitrogen, widely used in the agricultural industry, Tagana disclosed.

"In every 1 hectare of farmland, at least 6 bags of urea wiil be used while by using rice straws for a 1 hectare ricefield, only 2 bags of urea will be used since rice straw spread in a 1 ha. area is equivalent to 3-4 bags of urea," Tagana explained.

Tagana further revealed how it should be done. "Before planting rice, the field must be distributed with rice straw, and after three days, trichoderma, a kind of fungus will be sprayed to hasten the decay of the compost, then the putting of seeds begin. "

It was learned that Modified Rice Composting is one way to minimize the use of commercial fertilizer with the use of decomposed rice straw, Every ton of inbred palay yields about two tons of rice straw while for every ton of hybrid rice, about one ton of rice straw is generated.

Tagana said that the Department of Agriculture (DA)– Central Office allocated P496,000.00 for the project. The program is closely coordinated by the Bureau of Soils-Water Management Inputs, the National Anti-Poverty Commission (NAPC) and the local government units concerned.

The municipalities that implemented the Modified Rice Composting were mentioned as follows: Macrohon, Tomas Oppus, Bontoc, Sogod, Libagon, St. Bernard, San Juan, Hinundayan, Hinunangan, Silago, Liloan and San Francisco and in Maasin City.