PILIPINAS- Sept 6 2021, “One possibility is to jointly develop west Philippine sea or south china sea. Give Philippines a bigger share” ang sagot ni Ambassador francis Chua sa tanong ng www.diaryongtagalog.net na “As a seasoned diplomat,what do you think are the solutions to resolve the west Philippine sea dispute?” si Ambassador Chua ay isa sa dalawang Hall of Fame awardee sa gaganaping Award for Promoting Philippine China Understanding (APPCU) sa pakikipagtulungan sa Chinese Embassy.
May malaking bahagi ang China at mga tsino sa kulturang Filipino bago pa dumating ang mga mananakop na europeo, patunay nito ay ang matagal na relasyon ng pagkakaibigan at pakikipagkalakalan ng mga tsino nuon sa mga Pilipino.
Kasalukuyang nababahiran ng hindi pagkakaunawaan ang dalawang bansa lalo sa usapin ng West Philippine Sea kaya naitanong ng pahayagang ito ang nasabing katanungan kay Ambassador Francis Chua na matagal naging embahador ng Pilipinas sa China at isa ring Chinese-Filipino.
Layunin ng parangal ay upang mapatatag ang pagkakaibigan at pagtutulungan ng China at ng Pilipinas. May tatlong kategorya ang mga parangal kabilang ang: 1. Hall of Fame, kung saan dalawa ang bibigyang parangal; ito ay sina dating Unang Ginang Imelda Romualdez Marcos at si Ambassador Francis Chua;
2. Outstanding Contributions, kabilang sa mga paparangalan sa kategoryang ito ay sina: Herman Tiu Laurel, Teresita Ang-See, Dr. Lourdes Tanhueco-Nepomuceno at Dr. Rommel C. Banlaoi habang ang 3. Major Contributions naman ay sina: Prof. Jaime Florcruz, Adolfo Paglinawan, Dr. and Atty. Mario Leonardo Emilio Aportadera at John Fernandez.
Sa nasabing virtual media forum tumugon ang mga awardee sa mga katanungan ng mga mamamahayag. Kabilang sa mga nakibahagi ay sina dating Pangulo at Congresswoman Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Mr. Peter T. Lavina,deputy Secretary General ng APCU, Mr. Yonghui Xie Councellor ng Chinese Embassy sa Maynila.
Gaganapin ang parangal ngayong Sept. 10, 2021 live sa PTV 4 at sa kanilang facebook page.///Michael Balaguer, +639262261791, konekted@diaryongtagalog.net at michaelbalaguer@yahoo.co.uk
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Bountiful Harvest: Bunga Farmers Association
Special Area for Agricultural Development (SAAD) Program allocated a total amount of ₱ 1,707,480.00 for vegetable production in four municipalities in the province of Southern Leyte. It consists 12 farmers association who are active and willing to impart their efforts through participating the project upon its implementation.
In the municipality of Bontoc , two associations were chosen as recipients of the Vegetable Production Project. 0ne of which is Bunga Farmers Association (BuFA). It was registered with DOLE dated March 07, 2019 with registration number RO800-SLFO-19-02-WA-0428 and has 27 active members. Most of the members of BuFA were a small-scale farmer with a monthly income ranges from ₱5,000.00 – ₱7, 000.00. The major source of income by most of the members were from coconut or copra. However, the minor commodities they produced were corn, peanut, cassava and upland rice.
During 3rd quarter of 2020, BuFA received the inputs (seeds, tools and equipment) for vegetable production with a total amount of ₱284,580.00. The reason of being delayed on the implementation of the said project was caused by COVID-19. Some minimum health protocols must be followed and farmers could not easily move, local barangay lockdown also attributed to extend their planned activity. Land preparation was only realized on November 2020. On the second week of December, the group started on planting their commodity in a one Hectare (1 Ha.) production area, though they encountered bad weather condition and minimal pest infestation.
Amidst pandemic, BuFA never lose hope, they kept on safeguarding and took care of the area being planted. Their hard work started paying off on 2nd week of March 2021, when they harvested various vegetables like lady finger, sweet pepper, eggplant, string beans, bitter gourd, petchay and squash, until June 2021, except eggplant & sweet pepper – the said crops are still on-going on its production. For its first cycle, the group gained a total of ₱ 415,075.70 gross sales. To ensure that this vegetable project will continue and will be sustained, the budget that will be used for its 2nd cycle was set aside. Since fetching water was one of the major challenges in the area, they bought water pump as a project made from the 1st cycle gains. They as of now, the BuFA is preparing for their second cycle, they are planning to continue on vegetable production and integrate it with native or egg layer production and hoping for an optimistic result in the future.
Amid the pandemic that were facing the group, still continue their cooperation in cultivating and managing with much TLC (Tender loving care) to their commodity. According to the group, they are grateful for the vegetable project entrusted to them by SAAD. Through good camaraderie and hard work, BuFA members dreamed to uplift the lives of every family and share their bountiful harvest to others. # # # (Rovelyn V. Timkang / DA-RFO VIII, SAAD)
Saving the world-renowned coffee trees at the foothills of Mt. Apo
In their quest to increase farm income, some of our coffee farmers in Bansalan, Davao del Sur have adopted vegetable farming and abandoned and even cut their coffee trees due to price advantages and constraints in production support such as quality of inputs.
And these are the Arabica coffee trees that have put not just their community but the whole country in the World map of best brew.
In line with the Department of Agriculture (DA) Secretary William Dar’s key Strategies to Transform the PH Agriculture thru farm consolidation and diversification, DA-Davao region thru its Research Division in partnership with the Bansalan Municipal Agriculture Office (MAO) has introduced farming system technologies that would save the abandoned coffee trees while helping farmers increase not just their income but the land productivity of their crops.
“We have 60 farmer-beneficiaries with 105-hectare total consolidated production area under the Outscaling of Arabica Coffee-Based Farming System (Coffee+White Potato+Upland Vegetable) which is a project funded by the Bureau of Agricultural Research (BAR). These farmers have received production support such as fertilizers for the revitalization of old and unproductive coffee trees, vegetable seeds. We will be conducting more technical skills training especially on value-adding techniques and intensified monitoring in partnership with MAO-Bansalan,” said DA-XI Research Chief Melani A. Provido.
She added that this is also an answer to the DA Secretary’s call to involve the smallholder farmers and the community as a whole in R&D and technology commercialization process to make sure that research projects must have real application in the real world and one that creates more business enterprises. # # # (Celso C. Vergara / DA-RFO XI, RAFIS)