Is there any hope at all of restoring the buntal hat industry to its old fame and glory?

On the centennial anniversary of the first buntal hat woven in Baliuag, Bulacan, the fourth generation descendant of Dolores Maniquis came back to Baliuag after some years of absence. He pickup the torch to bring back the buntal straw hat weaving to its traditional way and added innovative designs and style to compete in the global market. He grew up in the buntal hat environment under the guidance of his aunt Ester E. Villones, his name is Marc R. de Borja, the Chief Executive Officer of Far East Straw Hats Corporation.

Marc is a graduate of De La Salle College in Manila, Philippines and a Certified Public Accountant by profession. His experience in financial management aided him a lot to organize and make managerial decision to make into reality, the concept he devised to improve the straw hat weaving process. With this as his objective he revived the cottage industry of straw hat making with a touch of current trend in fashion.. His design and style is registered with the Intellectual Property Office , formerly the Bureau of Patents and Tradenames. The company logo he adapted shows the silhouette of the straw hat and with strands of the buntal fiber around the map of the Philippines.

After doing all the preparations to launch the straw hat product, in January, 2008 he began to market the finished straw hats here in the Philippines with an exclusive distributorship with Tesoro’s. He will start offering the straw hats in the global market in the summer of 2008 .

For more information about this company, log-in at www.feshc.com .

By 1910, hat weaving had become a booming cottage industry in Baliwag. One of the prominent pioneers of this industry was the late Anacleto Chico, alias Tandang Quito. Baliwag buntal hat, otherwise known as balibuntal or balihat essentially differen from Lucban buntal hat in texture and weaving method. The balibuntal hat was more closely woven and texturally finer. As the undistry grew, specialization inevitably set in and imporved production methods became satndard practice. Ever since the Baliwag buntal hat became a great dollar earning export during the 1920s, its manufacturing process has imporved appreciatively too.

Passed off abroad as Panama hat, the buntal hat beganto suffer a serious slump in sales in thelatter part of the 1920s because of cutthroat competition from China. It is said that sometiem in 1923, the Chinese in Hongkong hired Filipino weavers to work there.

After the war, the buntal hat undustry began to thrive new. Baliwag weavers were produring an average 40 000 hats a month until the 1960s.

Until now, the industry is still thriving hard to bring back its lost glory. There sure is the surviving producers optimistic agreement, if only the government would give it the protection and attention it deserves.

 

Historical Source: Baliuag: Then and Now by R. E. Villacorte

Buntal Hat Update Source: Marc de Borja, Far East Straw Hats Corporation

 

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