SURSECO II is outstanding Electric Cooperative of the Year
Tandag City, Surigao del Sur1 (14 April) - Another laudable recognitions from the Rural Electrification leading agency has been received by SURSECO II and its General Manager recently during the Annual Lumens awarding ceremony held at Taal Vista hotel in Tagaytay City.
The coop is chosen by the National Electrification Administration (NEA) as an “Electric Cooperative of the Year”, Large Cooperative classification based in 2009 performance. This award is given by NEA to cooperatives to recognize its outstanding performance in all areas of Electric Cooperative (EC) operations, depicting preparedness to the stiff competition being called for by the new electric power industry.
Not only SURSECO II itself received a laudable recognition from NEA but also the General Manager (GM) as well. GM Engr. Iglorio R. Hinayon is also recognized as “General Manager of the Year” in recognition of his outstanding performance in managing the affairs of cooperative, prudent leadership and undisputable competence that led SURSECO II to the roster of Elite EC.
Aside from NEA, presidential Adviser on Rural Electrification (PARE) Secretary Francisco G. Silva also recognized GM Hinayon by giving the “Grand Leadership Award” in recognition of his consistent manifestation of a seasoned manager-leader, and for unrelentless efforts in sharing his talents, learning and experiences to other electric cooperatives wanting improvement in their operation thus a “True Champion” of the Rural Electrification, solidarity and teamwork in the region.
The awards were personally received by SURSECO II General Manager and Board President, Hon. Jose Trugilio Sr. Last year, the coop has also received some major awards in recognition of its excellent performance in 2008 operation.
These recognitions are the manifestations of the unyielding efforts of SURSECO II BODs, management, staff and employees to render excellent service and implementing the rural electrification program of our government to the people of Surigao del Sur particularly in the 1st District of the province and in continuous supports of out local officials headed by 1st Dist. Rep. Philip A. Pichay and Governor Vicente Pimentel, Jr. and the rest to the plans and programs of our coop. Finally, this could not be achieved by SURSECO II without the mass supports of its member-consumers. (Aguinaldo Jaluag, SURSECO II/PIA Surigao del Sur)
Cassava production a promising venture for Pinoy farmers
BUTUAN CITY (14 April) – Due to its huge potential market, cassava production is a promising agribusiness venture for Filipino farmers.
In an interview over Tingog sa Kaumahan a radio program of the Department of Agriculture Regional Field Unit 13 aired over DXMK Magik FM Butuan, Dr. Candido Damo, Cassava Project Leader under GMA Corn Program who recently visited Caraga Region during the Good Agriculture Practices (GAP) training revealed that cassava production in the country haven’t meet yet the demand of the market thus opportunity still awaits to the farmers.
He said that based on five year projected demand established during the recently held National Cassava Stakeholders Meeting, the demand for the current year 2010 pegged at 5 million metric tons and expected to increase to 10 metric tons by 2014.
“Sa ngayon base sa production natin noong 2009, nagsusuplay lang tayo mga 46% of the demand, so malaki pa talaga yung market potential in terms of local consumption natin (As of 2009 production, we are only supplying about 46% of the current demand, so there’s still huge market potential), he said.
Due to the gap between cassava production and the demand, some of the processors import supplies from other countries such as Thailand to fill in their requirements.
However, Dr. Damo expressed optimism that pinoy farmers could meet the demand of the industry due to positive status of cassava production in the country that continually surge in terms of volume production brought by increased area planted and yield per unit area.
“Sa ngayon meron na tayong 2.04 thousand MT na production sa cassava at tumaas din yung yield level from 8 to 9.7 MT per hectare now”, he revealed.
Aside for human consumption, about 80% of cassava production goes to feed formulation by feed millers as ingredients for animals and aqua feeds.
To boost production in the country, the Department of Agriculture through the GMA Corn Program wherein cassava is a sub-project, give focus on the commodity through the three major interventions.
Firstly, according to Dr. Damo is mass propagation of new varieties with high yield potential. “We already started mass propagation of planting materials on these varieties in 16 regional field units of DA wherein this could be sources of the farmer organizations as starting planting materials in their respective areas.
Secondly, “we provides post harvest equipments such as cassava chipper or cassava granulator to cut short processing time and thirdly we are busy conducting trainings on our regional staff, local government units extension workers and farmer leaders and also we are reproducing leaflets or techno-guides to transfer to them new technologies”, Dr. Damo narrated.
He is also hopeful that the five year plan will be approved to give more focus on cassava industry in the country incorporating the research and development (R&D) component.
“Kasi alam natin marami pa tayong kailangang pag-aralan para lalong mapaganda ang cassava production sa Pilipinas (Because we all know that there are numerous factors that needs to be studied to further boost up cassava production in the Philippines”, he said.
For farmers whether individual or organized cassava growers who would like to take part of the project, Dr. Damo urged them to visit their nearest DA Regional Offices and look for the regional corn coordinators or the regional cassava focal person to shed light on them on the particular interventions that they could get out of the program. (Aurell P. Arais, RAFID DA-13/ PIA-Caraga)
Food for work programme to empower communities to rebuild after typhoons
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in partnership with the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) is preparing to assist communities devastated by the typhoons which lashed the Philippines late last year to rebuild homes and infrastructure, through a Food-for-Work (FFW) programme.
Some 95,000 households from the poorest and worst-hit communities stand to benefit in the first months. Under the Food-for-Work schemes, participants will contribute their labour to community-chosen rehabilitation and reconstruction projects in exchange for food. The FFW programme comes into effect as general food distributions, the initial response to last year’s typhoon, begin to wind-down.
Under the first round of FFW projects 3, 475 metric tons of rice will this month be dispatched to areas across six regions of Luzon (R I, II, III, IV-A, NCR and CAR) for those working on 450 community projects. These include the rehabilitation of 300 damaged shelters and the maintenance of some 200 km of roads as well as schemes to unclog canals, environmental cleanup campaigns and training for communities on disaster preparedness.
WFP and DSWD are committed to working closely with affected communities, local government units and other partners in order to rebuild lost assets. The second round of typhoon recovery and mitigation projects will be rolled out in June this year.
WFP is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide. In 2010 WFP aims to feed more than 90 million people in 73 countries.
WFP now provides RSS feeds to help journalists keep up with the latest press releases, videos and photos as they are published on WFP.org. For more details see: http://www.wfp.org/rss
WFP has a dedicated ISDN line in Italy for quality two-way interviews with WFP officials.
For more information please contact (email address: diana.donato@wfp.org): Diana Donato, WFP/Manila, Tel. +63 2 7502561, Cell. +63 917 8809368. (WFP)
Tandag City, Surigao del Sur1 (14 April) - Another laudable recognitions from the Rural Electrification leading agency has been received by SURSECO II and its General Manager recently during the Annual Lumens awarding ceremony held at Taal Vista hotel in Tagaytay City.
The coop is chosen by the National Electrification Administration (NEA) as an “Electric Cooperative of the Year”, Large Cooperative classification based in 2009 performance. This award is given by NEA to cooperatives to recognize its outstanding performance in all areas of Electric Cooperative (EC) operations, depicting preparedness to the stiff competition being called for by the new electric power industry.
Not only SURSECO II itself received a laudable recognition from NEA but also the General Manager (GM) as well. GM Engr. Iglorio R. Hinayon is also recognized as “General Manager of the Year” in recognition of his outstanding performance in managing the affairs of cooperative, prudent leadership and undisputable competence that led SURSECO II to the roster of Elite EC.
Aside from NEA, presidential Adviser on Rural Electrification (PARE) Secretary Francisco G. Silva also recognized GM Hinayon by giving the “Grand Leadership Award” in recognition of his consistent manifestation of a seasoned manager-leader, and for unrelentless efforts in sharing his talents, learning and experiences to other electric cooperatives wanting improvement in their operation thus a “True Champion” of the Rural Electrification, solidarity and teamwork in the region.
The awards were personally received by SURSECO II General Manager and Board President, Hon. Jose Trugilio Sr. Last year, the coop has also received some major awards in recognition of its excellent performance in 2008 operation.
These recognitions are the manifestations of the unyielding efforts of SURSECO II BODs, management, staff and employees to render excellent service and implementing the rural electrification program of our government to the people of Surigao del Sur particularly in the 1st District of the province and in continuous supports of out local officials headed by 1st Dist. Rep. Philip A. Pichay and Governor Vicente Pimentel, Jr. and the rest to the plans and programs of our coop. Finally, this could not be achieved by SURSECO II without the mass supports of its member-consumers. (Aguinaldo Jaluag, SURSECO II/PIA Surigao del Sur)
Cassava production a promising venture for Pinoy farmers
BUTUAN CITY (14 April) – Due to its huge potential market, cassava production is a promising agribusiness venture for Filipino farmers.
In an interview over Tingog sa Kaumahan a radio program of the Department of Agriculture Regional Field Unit 13 aired over DXMK Magik FM Butuan, Dr. Candido Damo, Cassava Project Leader under GMA Corn Program who recently visited Caraga Region during the Good Agriculture Practices (GAP) training revealed that cassava production in the country haven’t meet yet the demand of the market thus opportunity still awaits to the farmers.
He said that based on five year projected demand established during the recently held National Cassava Stakeholders Meeting, the demand for the current year 2010 pegged at 5 million metric tons and expected to increase to 10 metric tons by 2014.
“Sa ngayon base sa production natin noong 2009, nagsusuplay lang tayo mga 46% of the demand, so malaki pa talaga yung market potential in terms of local consumption natin (As of 2009 production, we are only supplying about 46% of the current demand, so there’s still huge market potential), he said.
Due to the gap between cassava production and the demand, some of the processors import supplies from other countries such as Thailand to fill in their requirements.
However, Dr. Damo expressed optimism that pinoy farmers could meet the demand of the industry due to positive status of cassava production in the country that continually surge in terms of volume production brought by increased area planted and yield per unit area.
“Sa ngayon meron na tayong 2.04 thousand MT na production sa cassava at tumaas din yung yield level from 8 to 9.7 MT per hectare now”, he revealed.
Aside for human consumption, about 80% of cassava production goes to feed formulation by feed millers as ingredients for animals and aqua feeds.
To boost production in the country, the Department of Agriculture through the GMA Corn Program wherein cassava is a sub-project, give focus on the commodity through the three major interventions.
Firstly, according to Dr. Damo is mass propagation of new varieties with high yield potential. “We already started mass propagation of planting materials on these varieties in 16 regional field units of DA wherein this could be sources of the farmer organizations as starting planting materials in their respective areas.
Secondly, “we provides post harvest equipments such as cassava chipper or cassava granulator to cut short processing time and thirdly we are busy conducting trainings on our regional staff, local government units extension workers and farmer leaders and also we are reproducing leaflets or techno-guides to transfer to them new technologies”, Dr. Damo narrated.
He is also hopeful that the five year plan will be approved to give more focus on cassava industry in the country incorporating the research and development (R&D) component.
“Kasi alam natin marami pa tayong kailangang pag-aralan para lalong mapaganda ang cassava production sa Pilipinas (Because we all know that there are numerous factors that needs to be studied to further boost up cassava production in the Philippines”, he said.
For farmers whether individual or organized cassava growers who would like to take part of the project, Dr. Damo urged them to visit their nearest DA Regional Offices and look for the regional corn coordinators or the regional cassava focal person to shed light on them on the particular interventions that they could get out of the program. (Aurell P. Arais, RAFID DA-13/ PIA-Caraga)
Food for work programme to empower communities to rebuild after typhoons
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in partnership with the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) is preparing to assist communities devastated by the typhoons which lashed the Philippines late last year to rebuild homes and infrastructure, through a Food-for-Work (FFW) programme.
Some 95,000 households from the poorest and worst-hit communities stand to benefit in the first months. Under the Food-for-Work schemes, participants will contribute their labour to community-chosen rehabilitation and reconstruction projects in exchange for food. The FFW programme comes into effect as general food distributions, the initial response to last year’s typhoon, begin to wind-down.
Under the first round of FFW projects 3, 475 metric tons of rice will this month be dispatched to areas across six regions of Luzon (R I, II, III, IV-A, NCR and CAR) for those working on 450 community projects. These include the rehabilitation of 300 damaged shelters and the maintenance of some 200 km of roads as well as schemes to unclog canals, environmental cleanup campaigns and training for communities on disaster preparedness.
WFP and DSWD are committed to working closely with affected communities, local government units and other partners in order to rebuild lost assets. The second round of typhoon recovery and mitigation projects will be rolled out in June this year.
WFP is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide. In 2010 WFP aims to feed more than 90 million people in 73 countries.
WFP now provides RSS feeds to help journalists keep up with the latest press releases, videos and photos as they are published on WFP.org. For more details see: http://www.wfp.org/rss
WFP has a dedicated ISDN line in Italy for quality two-way interviews with WFP officials.
For more information please contact (email address: diana.donato@wfp.org): Diana Donato, WFP/Manila, Tel. +63 2 7502561, Cell. +63 917 8809368. (WFP)
