Manila - Building the resilience of farmers is a key priority of FAO’s recovery and rehabilitation efforts in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan. For farmers whose coconut stands were destroyed by the typhoon, this means being provided with a stable source of alternative livelihood that can be sustained even with limited land resources and capital.

In response to this challenge, FAO established Sloping Agricultural Land Technology (SALT) sites in Haiyan-affected areas to allow coconut-based farming communities to plant short-term and annual crops to provide alternative livelihood sources and make use of idle land under coconut plantations. SALT (also known as contour farming) was adopted in these areas because it is an ecologically-sound method of upland and contour farming that is specifically developed for smallholder farmers with few tools, little capital and limited farming grounds.

Lalane Perucho, a coconut farmer from Balete, Aklan is one of the beneficiaries of FAO’s recovery and rehabilitation response programme. Lalane and her husband have a small farm and lost several of their coconut stands and smaller crops after the typhoon. But like most women-headed households, she was unable to benefit from emergency employment and agricultural inputs provided by the Government and other agencies during the initial phases of recovery. This forced her to look for other means of income.  “Without the expected harvest, I do laundry work to support our family,” she said. “When my children leave for school, I used to plant vegetables and attend to other chores. But because my children are still young, I can only plant near our house.”

The SALT training provided Lalane with an opportunity to resume her farming activities within the vicinity of her community. “Before, we do not know that you can plant crops on a steep place like this. We learned a lot when we attended the SALT training,” she said. “We learned that we can plant in hilly areas and prevent erosion. Because of that we won't run out of land where we can plant.”

Through the training, farmers were provided with additional skills and techniques for intercropping. “We planted pineapple, but because it takes a year to harvest, we also planted eggplant, tomato and chilli, which we can harvest in three months,” Lalane explained.

SALT farming is also offering better prospects for farmers like Lalane to grow high-value crops like ginger and earn more income while they wait for their coconut stands to become productive again. “We now want to plant more crops like ginger because we can sell it at a higher price (per kilo),” Lalane added. “I have four children to support in their schooling. This additional source of income will help a lot.”

According to Peter Agnew, FAO Haiyan Programme Coordinator, the Haiyan recovery and rehabilitation programme for farmers was designed to not only link emergency to recovery, but take it to the next step in terms of diversifying their farming.  “Some coconut farmers were already diversifying their farms with rice and corn, but this is not suitable for every location which is why introducing SALT farming and bringing in other value-added options and high-value crops like ginger has been so important.”

To-date, FAO has established 92 SALT sites in Region VIII (Eastern Visayas) and 28 SALT sites in Region VI (Western Visayas) – benefitting around 35 500 households that rely on coconut-based farming systems for their livelihood. These SALT sites are located within the communities of the beneficiaries and therefore allow women to participate and learn from community farming activities and contribute to the income of the household

FAO’s Haiyan recovery and rehabilitation response programme for coconut-based farming systems (CBFS) is undertaken in collaboration with government partners from Departments of Agriculture, Agrarian Reform, Trade and Industry and the Philippine Coconut Authority.

The CBFS Programme is supported by the governments of Canada, Finland, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand and United Kingdom. The combined impact of the harmonized projects ensures broader scale resiliency, longer-term sustainability and a smoother transition from recovery to development assistance.