PAPAYA thrives well in hot weather conditions and grows in any part of tropical countries like the Philippines, and often propagated by seeds.
It is a tropical tree which is commonly known for its long, lobbed leaves, and large fruits which are filled with tiny black seeds.
However, sowing the black seeds of the papaya fruit is not a guarantee for the farmers to attain a good yield, primarily because some of the seeds may turn out to become a male papaya tree which will not bear fruits, thus wasting the time and effort of the poor farmer.
To address this concern which greatly affects the marginalized farmers, the Central Philippines State University (CPSU) in Kabankalan City, Negros Occidental, under the leadership of its newly-elected president, Dr. Aladino C. Moraca, Ph.D, developed and introduced the “Process of Papaya Asexual Propagation through Marcotting.”
This utility model generally relates to plant propagation, particularly to a process of propagating papaya through marcotting.
Marcotting, which is a type of vegetative plant propagation, is commonly known as air layering that involves rooting of a part of the stem while it is still attached to the parent plant.
Under the advocacy of Moraca, the successful process of marcotting the papaya tree was made possible through the combined efforts of a team of experts from the CPSU which is composed of Associate Professor 3 and CPSU Moises Padilla Campus Director Raymond C. Antonio; Associate Professor 4 and CPSU Quality Assurance Director Milagros M. Antonio; Associate Professor 5 and CPSU Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Fernando D. Abello; and, Associate Professor 3 and Dean of the CPSU College of Agriculture D. Salvador C. Castor, Jr.
The primary objective of the utility model is to provide a process of papaya asexual propagation where the grafted papaya tree will have a superior fruiting performance.
It aims to provide a process of papaya asexual propagation using the marcotting method in order for the plant to grow faster and produce fruits earlier than the conventional practice of cultivating papaya through the use of seeds.
Moraca says this will greatly help the small farmers to save their modest but hard-earned resources in terms of investments on acquiring expensive seeds, thus, encouraging the marginalized farmers to engage in the production of papaya by using the marcotting process developed by the CPSU.
Asexual methods are most often used to propagate cultivars with individual desirable characteristics that do not come true from the seeds.
Aside from directly benefitting the farmers, this utility model can also be utilized by those living in the urbanized areas where the space to propagate a plant is a perennial problem because a marcotted papaya tree can be grown in small containers like discarded pails or appropriate pots.
While the practice of marcotting has already been used to propagate different varieties of plants and trees, marcotting a papaya tree in the country can be relatively new to the local farmers until the process was developed by the CPSU for local adoption./PN
