‘Seaweed king’ Benson Dakay succumbs to kidney cancer

Cebu businessman Benson Dakay passed away at the St. Jude Medical Center in Los Angeles, where he had been confined since October last year.

His daughter Rere Dakay said the her father, 56, succumbed to complications of kidney cancer.

Dakay, who was known as the “seaweed king”  who made a fortune  in the export of carageenan or processed seaweed, was in a coma since October 25.

He had undergone two operations in St. Luke’s Medical Center in Quezcon City, the first in February 2010 to remove his left kidney and the second in April 2011, to replace part of his spine with titanium.

He succumbed to cancer on Jan. 5 at 5 a.m.

Dakay was  chief executive officer of Shemberg Corp., which includes Shemberg Marketing and Shemberg Biotech Corp., a top exporter of carrageenan.

Born in March 26, 1955, Dakay was  11 years old when he first took interest in  local seaweed after seeing a lot of them while diving in Talisay City,  Cebu in 1966.

He then borrowed P10,000 from his father to send samples to prospective clients after learning about the seaweed Eucheuma.

He started small until he was able to build his own manufacturing plant in 1979, which was the first carrageenan refinery in Asia to produce semi-refined carrageenan, a binding  agent in   many food  and pharmaceutical products  from milk and meat products to drugs and toothpaste.

His clients around the world held  30 percent of the global market with a production capacity of 10,000 metric tons supplying brands such as Colgate-Palmolive, Quaker, Mars, and Nestle.

In 1988, Dakay was one of the awardees of the Ten Outstanding Young Men for Aquaculture and Agriculture.

Dakay was an industry champion who opened the US and European market for Philippine-made and manufactured carrageenan.

He led a campaign to promote acceptance of  carrageenan as a non-toxic food additive in the US in 1990 and then in Europe in 1996.

Dakay became president of the Seaweed Industry Association of the Philippines (SIAP), an organization of farmers and manufacturers.

In 2010, Dakay led SIAP in asking the Philippine government to regulate the export of raw seaweed citing the huge local demand, which wasn’t satisfied.

The trend  forced major seaweed manufacturers like Shemberg to source their raw materials from other countries like Indonesia.

Dakay once said  the Philippines could be the biggest producer of euchema seaweed but  production of carrageenan has been declining since 2004.

From  peak production  in 2004 with 103,000 metric tons it  continued to decrease by as much as 32 percent from 2005 to 2009.

Dakay’s conference with  Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala in Cebu last August 2010 was the businessman’s last time to attend activities  for SIAP.

The meeting  led to Alcala’s pledge of P1 million to set up an integrated nursery to help boost production of seaweeds in the country.

In March last year, Dakay  announced that Shemberg was considering moving its manufacturing plant to Indonesia,  where supply of raw  seaweed is abundant but no official update of the plan has confirmed whether the move is final.

Philexport executive director Fred Escalona said Dakay was a prime mover in the industry and a big loss to Cebu and and the country.

Dakay was one of the pioneers of the industry in Cebu.

His remains will be brought to Cebu in 10 to 12 days, according to his daughter in a text message to Cebu Daily News.

Dakay is survived by his wife Rosemary, sons Pierre Collin and Benson Ernest, and daughters Rere and Meme. /With Inquirer report