Bukidnon coffee farmer brews success, now a model farmer of Nescafé

As the center’s newest Learning Site for Agriculture (LSA), Mr. Leo B. Zambrano’s Integrated Farm in Barangay Kaatuan, Lantapan, Bukidnon is a showcase farm which serves as a demonstration area for his fellow farmers in neighboring communities as well as other municipalities in Bukidnon covered by the Project Coffee+. Here, Mr. Zambrano takes a posterity pose with ATI-RTC X Center Director Maria Lydia A. Echavez holding a pack of Nescafé bearing his face and name.

ATI Compound, El Salvador City---Since becoming one of the center’s newest Learning Site for Agriculture (LSA) partners on October 6 this year, coffee farmer Leo B. Zambrano is gradually becoming a household name thanks to his recent popularity as one of the model farmers of Nescafé (Classic variant).

Mr. Zambrano’s farm, the Zambrano’s Integrated Farm in Barangay Kaatuan in Lantapan, Bukidnon is an integrated farm practicing applicable agricultural technologies and employing doable farming strategies. It is relatively advanced compared to the rest of the traditional farms. His integrated farm is a crop combination of coffee, fruit trees, sayote, and sweet pepper plus other Small-Medium-Long (SML) term crops.

As one of the center’s LSA, it will serve as model or an example to other farmers to showcase applicable agriculture technologies and agri-products / by-products processing technologies. In this way, LSA farms are seen to help improve capabilities of small farmers and other rural community members. To date, the center has now 110 LSA partners, 14 Schools for Practical Agriculture (SPA) and two Extension Service Providers (ESP).

Zambrano as a passionate and dedicated farmer since 1983, is the current Chairman of the Palambuon Farmer Association and now the Coffee Ambassador in the Philippines for the Project Coffee+ (read as Project Coffee Plus) of Germany’s Gesellschaft fuer Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) with Nestlé.

The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is a federal government-owned corporation with worldwide operations. GIZ helps people and companies develop their own prospects for the future and improve their living conditions.

Having since ‘discovered’ and posted on ATI Northern Mindanao’s Official Facebook page, Zambrano, pictured along with the rest of his co-LS owners, ATI management and staff have already incurred 2.6K likes and 1.6K shares online. (with reports provided by Ms. Cristine A. Galupo, Agriculturist-II)