The government is now speeding up the development of a superior breed of coconut that it will be mass-produced for planting and replanting in areas that will soon be devoted to coconut to strengthen the country's coco agribusiness.

A total of 1.35 million hectares of land will be devoted to coconut as part of the government's effort to boost exports. Aside from copra, coconut's main product, the government wants to enhance its byproducts for agribusiness development.

Recently, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) launched a P30-million joint project that will involve the establishment of fiber-processing zones in two major coconut-producing regions - Region IV-A in Southern Tagalog and Region V, or the Bicol Region.

The two regions were identified by the DA and the DAR as having the capacity to sustain the operation of a fiber-processing facility for the production of geotextiles for export.

Experts from the Department of Agriculture - Biotechnology Implementation Unit met with officials of the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA), led by Deputy Administrator Carlos Carpio, and some of agency's senior researchers from Zamboanga and Albay last Friday to assess on-going research and development and find new directions for the strengthening of the coconut industry through biotechnology.

Director Alicia Ilaga, chief of DA's Biotech Implementation Unit, wants to know whether the PCA's ongoing researches are making progress.

During the meeting, senior researchers of the agency made their respective presentations, among which is the clonal propagation of coconut.

Using modern biotechnology, Cristeta A. Cueto, a senior research specialist of the PCA's Tissue Culture Division - Albay Research Center in Banao, Guinabatan, Albay, is attempting to mass-produce plantlets from immature flowers of coconut.

The project, which started in 1989, has succeeded in regenerating plantlets, but the level of success was still low.

"We need to perfect the process and we want to achieve a higher level of success," she said.

Clonal propagation of coconut requires the nonlethal or safe extraction of plumular tissues from immature flowers of coconut. The tissues will be processed for colloid formation and multiplication.

From there, multiembryo will be formed from which embryo germinant grow for regeneration of plantlets.

Cueto said she wants to produce at least 100 for every immature flower tissue she extracts.

Ilaga said there's a need to do more extensive research to enhance the development of superior coconut breed that can also propagate.