A PROPOSED COCONUT AGRO-TOURISM COOP FARM AND DISTILLERY

The “Food Basket” of CALABARZON, Quezon Province contributes to the major agricultural products including coconuts (Lago, 2017). The tree of life, known as coconut, is one of the most valued crops in the Philippines contributing 3.6% of the country’s gross value-added (GVA) in agriculture (Castillo & Ani, 2019). Quezon struggles on its uncompetitive agri-based products, lack of value adding, and weak linkage in the industry making them unable to lead the country’s gross coconut production. Furthermore, Quezon’s traditional processes are becoming a hindrance to its industry’s growth due to being labor intensive, inefficient, unproductive, lack of farmer’s cooperative, and lack of marketing and promotional strategies (Lago, 2017). Thus, the tourism sector should be involved in agriculture to stimulate its potential by matching in-demand labor intensive products and services within the community that will result in a more resilient local economy through local produce. It will create job and income opportunities, accumulate capital and technology, and foster other dimensions of economic and social development for the benefit of the poor (Lago, 2017). The Proposed Coconut Agri-Tourism Co-op Farm & Distillery would be a solution by merging agriculture and tourism into one, enabling to deal with the problems through social networks (Guzman et al., 2017) and agri-tourism (Lago, 2017), uplifting not only the quality and production of coconuts and its products but also the poor farmers in the province whom deserves to be rewarded for their hard work in the industry.