SAN CARLOS CITY – This city will hold its sixth Mango and Bamboo Festival on April 29 to showcase its chief products, mango and bamboo, to the world and gain more recognition and support for the two crops.

Mayor Julian Resuello said the day-long festival will be marked with street-dancing where the participants will don costumes bearing mango and bamboo motifs; a program and contests on the different food preparations derived from mangoes.

He said there will also be a contest in the making of bamboo basket called “tiklis”, the roughly-woven container of newly harvested mango fruits.

Resuello said that when the city government here launched the first Mango and Bamboo Festival in 2000, it was copied by adjacent town and cities, like Dagupan, Calasiao, Binmaley and Mapandan.

The festival was timed during the feverish harvesting of mango fruits in all 86 barangays of San Carlos City, incidentally the biggest city in terms of both area and population in the whole of Region 1.

“Now, every town and city in the province of Pangasinan are holding their own festivals after we started it for them to drumbeat to the nation and the world their respective chief products,” he narrated.

City Agriculturist Domingo Resuello admitted that for the past 15 years, Pangasinan has been consistently the top producer of mangoes throughout the Ilocos region, with San Carlos city as the top mango producer in Pangasinan.

There is no doubt that Pangasinan will maintain the lead in mango production throughout the region for the next 15 years but San Carlos City may soon be dislodged by the town of Bugallon as the top mango producer in Pangasinan, he said.

He noted that thousands of mango trees have been planted in several plantations in Bugallon for the last five years, more than what the people of San Carlos City had planted for the same period.

“Our mango planting and replanting program is continuing but they planted more mango trees in Bugallon town, being hilly and very conducive for the growth of the crop. Statistics show there are now 200,000 standing mango trees in San Carlos City with some 150,000 of them fruit-bearing. The city agriculture office listed some 6,000 families whose livelihood depends on mango.

Ripe mangoes are sold today at P40 per kilo (at three pieces) while the green ones are sold at P21 per kilo of three pieces.