Finally, in the highlands of Bukidnon, in Mindanao, there are immense areas which can be cultivated and planted with motor-drawn machinery. After taking off the first crop it would be readily possible to plough, harrow and seed in one operation, and here, if anywhere, modern harvesters and threshers can be employed to good advantage. In short, rice can be grown in Bukidnon as wheat is grown in the United States, and the company which goes into this business on a large scale should make money.
Abacá, commonly called Manila hemp, was for many years the most important Philippine export. The plants from which it is produced resemble bananas so closely that the uninitiated cannot distinguish them. They furnish the longest and strongest cordage fibre in the world. The Philippines have practically a monopoly on its production. Abacá culture is carried on in a very primitive way. The plants require well-drained soil and for this reason the Filipino often puts them out on steep mountain sides. The forest is felled, the timber is burned on the ground and the young plants are set before weeds have time to encroach. The bolo is usually employed for subsequent “cultivation,” which consists in the occasional chopping down of weeds. Fortunately the shade in an abacá plantation is so deep that it materially impedes the growth of other plants. The fibre is obtained from the leaf petioles which make up the stem. At the present time practically all of it is stripped by hand. This is a slow and tedious process, involving very severe physical exertion to which the average Filipino is disinclined, and serious losses often result from inability to get the crop seasonably stripped. Stripping is greatly facilitated if the knife under which the fibre bands are drawn has a serrated edge, but in that case the fibre is not thoroughly cleaned, soon loses its original beautiful white colour, and diminishes in strength owing to decay of the cellular matter left attached to it.
Preparing Rice Land for Planting.
Planting Rice.
The production of high-grade fibre or of comparatively worthless stuff is chiefly a matter of good or bad stripping.
Abacá requires evenly distributed rainfall and constant high humidity for its best development, and should not be planted in regions subject to severe drought, which greatly reduces the crop and may kill the plants outright. Experience has shown that it richly repays real cultivation.
The trunks are heavy, and water makes up a large part of their weight, but they are full of air chambers, float readily and could be rafted or sluiced to a central cleaning plant wherever conditions are favourable for so transporting them. The one great desideratum of the industry is a really good mechanical stripper which will turn out clean, high-grade fibre in large quantity at small cost. At least one machine has been brought reasonably near perfection. In my opinion all that is now necessary is to put a skilled mechanic into the field with it under service conditions, and keep him there until such minor difficulties as remain have been successfully overcome. Stripping mills could readily be established in regions like that along the lower Agusan River, where climate and soil are ideal and water transportation is always available. A reasonable number of such plants in successful operation would go far toward revolutionizing the hemp industry, the development of which is at present greatly handicapped by the production of enormous quantities of badly cleaned fibre, which does not sell readily, whereas first-class abacá is without a rival and always sells at a high price.
The table on the opposite page shows the value and amount of hemp exports during a period of fifteen years.