Philippine exhibitors at Gulfood target needs and sustainability

 Trade fairs are answers to needs and demands. These, as well, serve as answers to universal concerns such as wastage and unemployment. 

These are from three of the 25 participating companies of the “Food Philippines” Pavilion at the Gulfood2026,” Gulf Today met on Monday. 

Philippine Government officials, led by Ambassador to the UAE Alfonso Ferdinand Ver, inaugurated the 300-square metre display, sliced into fresh and processed fruits and vegetables, ethnic and gourmet products, non-alcoholic beverages, plant-based alternatives, cereals and cereal products, bakery products and confectionery, food ingredients and condiments, and ready-to-eat savories and prepared foods, at the Dubai Exhibition Centre. 

“All of us in our community would rise up together if we are going to act together. The more they plant saba, the more saba is harvested we can make into banana chips,” related Rowena Globio. 

The first time participant is a Business Administration graduate-Three Sisters Banana Chips owner/manager. Alongside her two sisters – a civil engineer and an industrial engineer – and their only brother food scientist, they are now behind the 1997-established family business their parents, Jose and Adela Revadeniero set up, a year after their father was laid off from the mining company, operating in their home province of Marinduque, in 1996. 

Engines were the Department of Agriculture-organised banana chips workshop Adela had attended thereafter and later on, the Php500.00 capital used to buy saba – the starchy sweet plantain indigenous to the Philippines from their farmer-neighbours, cooking oil and charcoal. 

“It was saba and banana chips that sustained our needs,” recalled Globio, teary-eyed, adding that the siblings eventually customised their respective university degrees in accordance to the business expansion they had long visualized. 

Saying that it has been their mission to “maximise” the “underutilized” saba “oversupply” in their province, basic ingredient source have been the family’s consequent two-hectare farm and the other on-the-average one-hectare farms of at least 70 farmers. 

Globio is positive that Gulfood would be the channel for their growing banana chips community from the Southwestern Tagalog Region of the Philippines. 

Positive too for the international breakthrough is Globio’s provincemate Elmer Marbello, another first-time participant. He set up the Marbello Processed Foods Manufacturing in 2017 not only in preparation for his retirement at 60; but for his daughter, a Bachelor of Science in Food Technology graduate from the University of the Philippines-Los Banos (UPLB) and currently a Marinduque State University researcher. 

According to the retired Marinduque Provincial Agriculture Centre chief, 65, it was the Department of Industry (DTI)-Mimaropa (Mindoro Provinces-Marinduque-Roblon-Palawan) Regional Office that funded their participation; to which he is grateful for. 

Marbello is thankful too to the assistance of the UPLB, Department of Science and Technology, Philippine Coconut Authority, and the Coconut Farmers and Industry Development Plan through which he has been able to research and develop high-value artisanal products out of the coconut, another Marinduque bounty. 

“We could give life with what used to be waste,” he said, referring to the “healthy bagoong” which is not a shrimp or fish paste, but the coconut pulp (sapal, Tagalog) bagoong. 

Also from MIMAROPA is second time participant Lionheart that owns and operates a 5,000-hectare farm of 600,000 coconut palms in Palawan. Derived from the coconut palms are nutritious coconut aminos, syrups, vinegars and coconut flower sap beverages. 

Global Sales head Anita Vogel said the signed Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement is a big help because “the commercial barriers are no more. Like any other market, the more we sell, the more products we need to generate, the more jobs. More jobs means better economy. So you start the positive cycle.” “We have 2,000 employees in the farm. We have to sell a lot of products to sustain that. That is why we are here again,” said Vogel, adding that from their “Gulfood 2025” experience, they are now ready to deliver what the Middle East market requires, namely certificates and the Arabic translations “which are important so we can talk to the market in their language.” As in the past, the “Food Philippines” participating companies to the “Gulfood 2026,” concluding on Jan. 30, have been participants at the International Food Exhibition ash, whose origins as the country’s premier food and beverage business-to-business platform, is the 1999 to 2003 “Asian Ethnic Food Festival.” “Gulfood 2025” participants generated $135 million in earnings.