Marco Lobregat: Model on campaign to recognize PH farmers

Marco Lobregat takes on new challenge to promote the best of the Philippines. PHOTO BY FILBERT KUNG

Marco Lobregat is no stranger to product endorsements.

As a commercial model, he worked on advertisements for various products and brands for several years.

But Lobregat is working on perhaps the biggest campaign of his professional life: The promotion of local food and tourism.

Lobregat, a business development executive for marketing communications company GeiserMaclang, is part of the “Mahalin Pagkaing Atin” movement, a nationwide campaign that aims to promote local food and sustainable farming.

The project seeks to encourage more farmers to invest in manufacturing local produce and corporations and entrepreneurs to buy homegrown food instead of resorting to imports, hoping to advance the quality of Filipino goods.

Farmers’ story

The movement spearheaded by GeiserMaclang aims to establish sustainable businesses in places with a high incidence of poverty, disaster or conflict.

It also aims to tell the story of the farmers, whose produce reflects the various geographical conditions in the country as well as the differences in local farming practices and culture.

He said he wanted to reach out to farmers and give them “pride of place” by encouraging them to integrate their products locally.

But he was not always this passionate about local food.

Lobregat used to work for media outfits abroad, writing supplements and advertorials for major publications.

After quitting his work abroad in 2009, he came back to the country and decided to start his own business while modeling at the same time.

“I wanted a business that I could understand and felt was grounded,” he said.

His family had a vacant farm in Lipa, Batangas, so he decided on farming.

But which crop?

“I had to sell something different,” he said.

He checked out grocery stores to find out what people were buying and he eventually zeroed in on mushrooms.

“I was looking at the shelves and the mushrooms were from Taiwan, Australia, Malaysia. I was like, if Malaysia can grow it, why can’t we grow it here in the Philippines?” Lobregat said.

And that was how it started. “I started reading some books and I fell in love,” he said.

“I fell in love because apart from food, which I love, and the applications of mushroom in food, I realized that it had implications on rural development,” he said, sharing some of his knowledge on the subject.

“Plants use the sun’s energy and chlorophyll to come up with the nutrients they need. Animals ingest their food, digest that and break it down. Fungi has its own kingdom,” he continued. “[I]t just pops up. Like, ‘where does it come from? How do you do it?’

“But fungi, basically, live in between the food. They are able to break down through cell walls, that’s why you get infected. It’s inside you. Mushrooms are fungi. Truffles work the same way, they infect the tree,” he explained.

Mushrooms

Lobregat said the types of mushrooms that had been studied so far only accounted for 10 percent of the species.

“Of those studied we’ve found penicillin, food cure and a lot of [other] applications. If we just study mushrooms and put our focus on them, there’s so much that can be found,” he said.

Mushrooms also help our forests, he said.

“If there were no bacteria and fungi, we’d be living in a ton of debris in forests, because [mushrooms] help decompose and bring [dead material] back to nature,” he explained.

It was this love for mushrooms that spawned Ministry of Mushrooms, a company he set up with his friends involved in the farming and marketing of gourmet mushrooms in the country.

But just like any business, mushroom farming had its challenges, said Lobregat.

One, getting the raw material was difficult, and two, he cited the need for a cold chain system, which was expensive.

“Growing mushroom is about replicating the environment,” he said. “You have to follow the life cycle, from spore to mycelium, to the fruiting of mushroom. It thrives at a certain temperature. Humidity is key. It’s a bit technical. It’s not like corn, you put the corn there, it’s going to grow. Mushroom is a bit finicky.”

Because of various difficulties, the business eventually folded up, he said. But he did not want to stop encouraging people from engaging in mushroom farming.

“I’m just hoping to be able to … talk about it and [continue] inspiring more people,” he said.

As for his own business, Lobregat said he does not look at the experience as a failure.

A stepping stone, maybe, to re-igniting his love for local food, tourism and culture.

Lobregat said his love for food had turned into an advocacy, with the Mahalin Pagkaing Atin campaign one of his ways not only to promote local products but also to give back to the farmers.

“I want to valorize them,” he said. “They provide us the food we eat. We’re an agricultural country and we’re forgetting that.”

Branding

During an event, Lobregat said, he met the owner of the startup Perfect Mushrooms—makers of Chicharooms or mushroom chicharon—whom he said saw “the idea of how storytelling, branding and valorizing” for mushroom farming worked.

“Those are the types of people that I want to be able to inspire,” he said. “These are the new farmers … We need to inspire more farmers.”

Lobregat is hopeful with regard to the state of Filipino produce. “With the movement now, as I have been working with a lot of chefs, they’re looking to valorize our local food and ingredients.”

Lobregat is not new to advocacy efforts.

In 2012, Lobregat started the Mushrooms Go Pink campaign (mushroomsgopinkph.com) in the Philippines to contribute to efforts to promote breast cancer awareness.

In countries like Canada and Australia, which are large exporters of mushrooms, money is raised to fund research on the use of mushrooms as therapy for breast cancer patients.

Here in the Philippines, Lobregat said he worked with restaurants by encouraging them to create a special dish with mushrooms in it. Ten percent of the proceeds then went to the ICanServe breast cancer awareness advocacy group.

For his efforts in mushroom farming, Lobregat was recently featured by US news website Buzzfeed.

Lobregat was also described as the world’s “hottest” mushroom farmer, but he did not take it seriously.

“I’ve never met this person in my life!” he said, referring to the Buzzfeed reporter.

But he does appreciate the report as he can use the recognition to promote his advocacy programs.

“At least I can use it, people will see there is something happening here in the Philippines, the advocacies are amplified,” he said.

Asked about what he learned from his years in mushroom farming, Lobregat shared the following lessons: First, strategize properly. “Think it through, think big, but have your feet on the ground.”

Second, have pride of product and place. “You have to be proud of your area, your product and what you do.”

Third: “When dealing with passion projects, make sure that they are sustainable, business-wise.”

Fourth, be inclusive. “[Being] a leader is not just about yourself. A true leader engages others. Don’t be so closed about your business and what you do. Include [others] and make sure you work with all your stakeholders and lift them up.”

And last, it’s important to live out your passions. “Find a way,” he said. “You’ve got to hustle! It will work. It will all fall into place.”

If it doesn’t? “It’s the journey, right? If it didn’t all work out, I had fun doing it,” he said.