LIVELIHOOD. Northern Samar Governor Edwin Ongchuan (3rd from right) awards certificates of project completion to farmers in the province. The World Bank-funded Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP) has turned over five livelihood projects in the province to aid poor communities. (Photo courtesy of Department of Agriculture)
TACLOBAN CITY – The World Bank-funded Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP) has turned over five livelihood projects in Northern Samar that will aid poor rural communities.
Jenny Lyn Almeria, Department of Agriculture (DA)-PRDP regional deputy project coordinator, said five farmer’s associations in Northern Samar finally received on March 31 their certificate of project completion of the enterprise development interventions through the PRDP.
These projects include the PHP1.28-million hog fattening and marketing enterprise; PHP1.24-million hog fattening and trading, PHP1.22-million vegetables enterprise and marketing, PHP1.26-million siganid and milkfish fish pen project, and PHP1.23-million mallard duck egg production and marketing.
“For small livelihood projects under PRDP, we define a project as completed in terms of the total accomplishment in the procurement and downloading of funds to the provincial local government unit. Therefore, the provincial government is now fully responsible for monitoring and sustaining the project,” Almeria said in a phone interview Monday.
Beneficiaries are from the towns of Las Navas, Catubig and Laoang.
Almeria said these enterprise interventions are a few of the 15 subprojects in Northern Samar since PRDP started in 2014. Out of the 15 subprojects, eight were turned over in the past.
“This marks another milestone not just for the PRDP but for the farmers of Northern Samar who were given the opportunity to improve their income as well as the farm production in their communities,” she added.
There are currently projects for Northern Samar which are expected to commence and will be completed soon.
Some of these are infrastructure development projects that have undergone regional project advisory board review.
“The DA-PRDP will continue to assist the province as the PRDP is about to launch its Scale-Up. This means that projects which were originally designed for six years can now be extended, and more interventions can be crafted for the improvement of the lives of the farmers,” Almeria said.
The inter-agency RPAB reviews and approves all projects before getting the nod of the Visayas Project Support Office, National Project Coordination Office and the World Bank.
The PRDP is a six-year project of the DA nationwide that aims to modernize and improve the resilience of the fisheries and agriculture sectors.
The six-year rural development project costing PHP27.5 billion is funded through a World Bank loan worth PHP20.56 billion, and PHP7 billion in counterpart funds from the central government and local government units. (PNA)
