A CANADIAN company is leasing 100 hectares of land inside the Camp John Hay Special Economic Zone in Baguio City where it plans to plant at least 100,000 coffee trees.
The premium coffee yield from the plantation will be marketed globally under the brand “John Hay Coffee.”
The Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA), the government agency authorized to oversee the country’s former military bases including Camp John Hay, announced that Canada’s Rocky Mountain Arabica Coffee Co. (RMACC) and John Hay Management Corp. (JHMC) have signed an agro-forestry management agreement for the venture.
JHMC Chairman Silvestre Afable Jr., JHMC President and Chief Executive Jamie Eloise Manzano-Agbayani, BCDA president, Chief Executive Officer Arnel Paciano Casanova and RMACC President Pierre Yves Cote signed the deal last month.
“This agreement will augur well for the people of Baguio as this will generate employment and at the same time put Baguio City in the map for producing high-quality coffee,” Casanova said.
The project, he added, will also help enhance the facility’s lush foliage.
Under the accord, RMACC will plant at least 100,000 trees of the high-quality Arabica coffee covering an area of about 100 hectares within Camp John Hay. This is in addition to the 60 hectares leased earlier by RMACC from the Camp John Hay Development Corp., a private company developing John Hay.
Casanova said RMACC expects to harvest some 300,000 kilograms of premium coffee yearly from its John Hay plantation.
Agbayani said RMACC’s agro-forestry venture will complement and improve the environment and ecosystem of the pine forest within the reservation.
RMACC also has existing plantations in Tuba, Benguet covering 16.5 hectares with 21,000 trees; Kiamba, Sarangani, 100 hectares; Kitanlad, Libona, Bukidnon, 100 hectares, and Marayon, Talakag, Bukidnon, 40 hectares.
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By: Max V. de Leon
Source: Business Mirror, Nov. 21, 2011
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