Every morning Rodel Tumbaga gathers the seaweeds brought to shore by the waves and piles them along the edge of a resort he works for in Bolinao, Pangasinan. Is there any use for them? Not that Rodel knows of. That’s why he just piles them there to rot. There’s no other place to dump them, he said. Besides, it would be too expensive to be hauling the same to a garbage dump. When Dr. Rene Sumaoang, the maker of Durabloom organic fertilizer, saw the long pile of seaweeds, he just shook his head. He said the seaweeds are a valuable resource that he could make use of. The same could be converted into mineral-rich organic fertilizer through fermentation.

Sarian, Z. (2017, April 6). Ferment your own fertilizer from seaweeds. Manila Bulletin, p. B-7.