By: Ven Rebo Arigo
Bohol hosts the 1st World Bank (WB) Implementation Support Mission of the Visayas Cluster of the Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP), gathering starting today foreign and national funders, local supporters and farmer beneficiaries.
Bohol is a pilot province of PRDP, a six-year government platform designed for an inclusive growth thru value chain-oriented and climate-smart agriculture and fishery sector.
It is jointly funded by the WB and Philippine government with the Department of Agriculture (DA) as implementing agency and concerned local government units counterparting.
Gov. Edgar Chatto welcomes the guests topped by WB-PRDP Team Leader Caroline F. Geron, DA Usec. Emerson Palad who is the PRDP national project director, and Deputy Project Director Arnel de Mesa.
The three-day WB review mission for PRDP in the Visayas starts in a plenary session at the Bellevue Resort in Panglao this morning.
DA Reg’l. Dir. Angel Enriquez said the mission on September 14-16 is highlighted by project site visits in Ubay for the Bohol Dairy Processing and Marketing Enterprise, Sagbayan for farm-to-market roads, and Talibon for a seaweed project.
The local stakeholders who gather during the mission include the provincial governors and other local chief executives involved in the PRDP from Regions 6, 7 and 8.
DA Region 6 Dir. Roy Abaya, also the Visayas Cluster director, will present in the plenary the PRDP Visayas accomplishments and updates.
It will be followed by Bohol and Negros Occidental presentations of their respective Provincial Commodity Investment Plans (PCIPs).
Tomorrow morning, the mission group will visit the Ubay project site where a discussion with the federation of dairy producers takes place, and then move to the road project sites in San Agustin and Canmaya Diot in Sagbayan in the afternoon.
The group will see the Talibon officials led by Mayor Restituto Auxtero on Wednesday before cruising to Cataban island marine protected area and global environment facility (GEF).
A discussion with island barangay officials and fisherfolk development group will ensue, until the mission team gets back to mainland Talibon for a meeting with municipal agriculture, fishery and protected area officers.
Chatto has readied all the local working committees of the province to assist the WB mission, which will frame the course of the implementation of PRDP components focusing on enterprises, livelihood and infrastructure support.
The WB mission for PRDP is actually taking a month, to also include its first implementation support missions in Mindanao and Luzon clusters.
In their Mindanao leg, Palad said the emphasis on market-oriented approach means the use of planning tools, particularly value chain analysis and expanded vulnerability and suitability assessment.
This determines the right investments for the development of priority commodities.
Also, De Mesa said, the PRDP ensures that good governance is mainstreamed through transparency and accountability measures at all stages of the project development cycle.
There will be a convergence platform for PRDP at the local level among related national and local agencies, producers, private sector, civil society, academe and other stakeholders.
An exit conference will cap the WB mission for PRDP which ultimate hope is to raise rural earnings, alleviate poverty and attain inclusive growth. (Ven rebo Arigo)