Oton: The country's watermelon town

The first two months of the new year always bring in the cool weather. Cold night breeze yet even cooler mornings, one can always wish for this weather to last year round. But as time flies, one might not even realize, summer is just around the corner. So goodbye to Mother Nature’s cool cuddle and welcome her warm embrace – it’s summertime! It’s synonymous vacation and travel, beaches and more travel. It also means cool eats – halo-halo, ice cream, cool drinks and fruits. Among the fruits of summer, watermelon and mango tops the list.

Iloilo is fortunate enough to have abundant sources of the two fruits that when summertime comes, it comes in great quantity and best quality at the bargain of prices. Here’s a feature on a national daily, The Manila Bulletin, how one Iloilo town supplies a large chunk of the country’s watermelon demand during this season.

Oton: The country's Watermelon town
By ZAC B. SARIAN | Manila Bulletin
January 7, 2011, 10:21pm

MANILA, Philippines – Oton town in Iloilo is considered the watermelon capital of the country. No less than 700 hectares are planted to this high-value crop every year in the town alone, according to Celsa Sorongon Suarez, the municipal agriculturist. In addition the Oton watermelon farmers go out to other towns and rent farms on which they also grow watermelon.

Oton Mayor Vicente Flores Jr. says watermelon has been planted by farmers as early as he can remember but no one seems to know who really started planting the crop in the town. Anyway, watermelon has become a very important crop for Oton farmers as well as the traders who ship out the harvests to Manila, Cebu and many other places.

Watermelon planting in Iloilo is quite unique. Instead of individual farmers growing their own crop, it is not uncommon for teams of workers and their financiers to grow watermelon on a joint venture basis. Just like the team of Jimmy Gaudeong and his two assistants.

We visited Jimmy and his team last December 2 when they harvested their joint venture project in Brgy Bantod, Tigbauan town. Jimmy is an Oton native but like many other growers, he goes out of Oton to look for suitable farms on which to grow watermelon. One should not grow watermelon on the same field year after year to avoid build up of disease organisms, according to him. Read More

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