Kakawate
Definition
Kakawate (Gliricidia sepium), internationally called gliricidia and in older sources madre de cacao (“mother of cacao”), is a thornless, nitrogen-fixing legume tree naturalized across the Philippines, recognized by its loose sprays of pinkish-purple flowers and pinnate leaves. It is the archetypal Philippine live-fence and shade tree, lopped for firewood, forage, green manure, and traditional farm preparations.
Identities
| Source | Identifier |
|---|---|
| Wikipedia | Gliricidia sepium |
| Wikidata | Q2717303 |
| DBpedia | N/A |
Also Known As
Madre de cacao; kakawati (variant spelling); mother of cocoa; in international agroforestry simply gliricidia.
Examples and Analogies
The classic image is the fence that refuses to stay dead: cut branches pounded into the ground leaf out and become a living hedge. Agronomists describe kakawate as the tropical farm’s Swiss-army tree — fence, fuel, feed, fertilizer, and shade in one rooting cutting.
Usage Scenarios
Filipino farmers plant it as boundary and contour hedgerows, shade over cacao and coffee, goat and cattle forage lopped fresh into troughs, biomass for compost and alley cropping, and garden sprays fermented from leaves against insect pests.
Strategies
Propagation is by cuttings — an advantage that turns pruning into planting — while management relies on regular lopping cycles that keep hedgerows dense and regrowth tender for fodder; intercropping layouts space trees to shade without starving annual crops.
Security and Safety Measures
Unlike its friendly leaves and flowers, the bark and seeds are toxic — a property once exploited for rat control — so seed-bearing material is kept from livestock feed, and leaf meal is introduced into rations gradually and in moderation.
Historical Context
The species spread through the tropical world as the shade tree of choice for cacao plantations, reaching Philippine farms by the colonial-period plantation networks; its Spanish name stuck in the local lexicon even as Tagalog speakers naturalized the Nahuatl-flavored “cacao” reference into kakawate.
Challenges and Controversies
Agroforesters debate its invasiveness in some settings and its competition with crops for light when lopping lapses; otherwise discussions are practical — comparing its forage quality with ipil-ipil and its fuelwood yield with madre cacao alternatives.