P 15.00 • 20 PAGES www.edgedavao.net VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014 EDGE Serving a seamless society DAVAO FCABBIE, 10 CABBIE STRIKES BACK Yesterday, accused taxi driver Santos D. Diez asked the City Pros- ecution Office to summon the sta- tion commander of Talomo Police Station and the head of Public Safe- ty and Security Command Center (PSSCC) for a clarificatory hearing. “In order to amplify my defens- es and aid the Honorable Office in arriving at a speedy trial and just resolution of this case, and knowing the inaction of the Talomo Police Station and PSSCC on my requests, ” Diez stated in his counter-affidavit filed last July 11. In his nine-page counter-affida- vit, Diez said that his counsel sent two letters of request to PSSCC and Talomo Police last June 23, se- cure pieces of evidences that could prove his innocence. According to the letter attached on the affidavit, Diez’s defense counsel composed of lawyers Ro- gelio G. Largo and Mohammad Ja- maludin A. Guinomla, requested the PSSCC to view the Close Circuit Television (CCTV) footage installed in Francisco Bangoy International Airport to Buhangin Crossing Mi- lan around 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. of June 7. Diez’s lawyers also asked the Talomo Police to retrieve the trip details of the taxi unit which is impounded on their station. Diez alleged that complainant Jesus Dizon II is merely making sto- ries to accuse him of the crime that he did not commit. He emphasized in his affida- vit that on June 8, they went to Taxi driver wants CCTV footage, taxi meter to prove pastor is lying LOOK MA, NO GUN. A bystander is amused to find a foot-patrolling new police recruit yester- day along Quezon Boulevard armed only with a meter-long stick. Lean Daval Jr. By ARMANDO B. FENEQUITO JR. [email protected]T HE taxi driver accused in robbing a pastor last month is pressing on his defense his accuser is making up stories.
Transcript
P 15.00 • 20 PAGESwww.edgedavao.netVOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
EDGE Serving a seamless society
DAVAO
FCABBIE, 10
CABBIE STRIKES BACK
Yesterday, accused taxi driver Santos D. Diez asked the City Pros-ecution Office to summon the sta-tion commander of Talomo Police Station and the head of Public Safe-ty and Security Command Center (PSSCC) for a clarificatory hearing.
“In order to amplify my defens-es and aid the Honorable Office in arriving at a speedy trial and just resolution of this case, and knowing the inaction of the Talomo Police Station and PSSCC on my requests, ” Diez stated in his counter-affidavit filed last July 11.
In his nine-page counter-affida-vit, Diez said that his counsel sent two letters of request to PSSCC and Talomo Police last June 23, se-cure pieces of evidences that could prove his innocence.
According to the letter attached on the affidavit, Diez’s defense counsel composed of lawyers Ro-gelio G. Largo and Mohammad Ja-maludin A. Guinomla, requested the PSSCC to view the Close Circuit Television (CCTV) footage installed in Francisco Bangoy International Airport to Buhangin Crossing Mi-lan around 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. of June 7. Diez’s lawyers also asked the Talomo Police to retrieve the trip details of the taxi unit which is impounded on their station.
Diez alleged that complainant Jesus Dizon II is merely making sto-ries to accuse him of the crime that he did not commit.
He emphasized in his affida-vit that on June 8, they went to
Taxi driver wants CCTV footage, taxi meter to prove pastor is lying
LOOK MA, NO GUN. A bystander is amused to find a foot-patrolling new police recruit yester-day along Quezon Boulevard armed only with a meter-long stick. Lean Daval Jr.
ThE taxi driver accused in robbing a pastor last month is pressing on his defense his accuser is making up stories.
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 20142
WEATHER FORECAST
EDGEDAVAO
THE BIG NEWS
OuTLeTS of the Na-tional Food Author-ity (NFA) in the city
are urged to ensure their operations cover the whole day as consumers raised the alarm on apparent con-trolled sale by some outlets.
This concern regard-ing his discovery of two National Food Authority (NFA) rice retailers who stop selling in the afternoon at the Agdao public market to NFA officials was raised during the weekly Kapi-han sa PIA media forum at
the Philippine Information Agency last Friday.
According to a consum-er, these NFA retailers just tell their customers that they need to close for the afternoon because they ran out of rice even if they still have available supply.
In regard to the consum-er’s concern, Virgilio Alerta, provincial manager of NFA Davao City, explained to the media how they discourage this practice of NFA rice re-tailers.
“Our director has in-
structions regarding that matter. If possible, NFA rice retailers in the market need to open early in the morning at 6:00 a.m. and close at 7:00 p.m. for the evening. Most consumers would rather buy rice right after dawn or in the late af-ternoon because they find it too hot during noon. We strongly encourage retail-ers to serve their customers from 6:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.,” he said.
Retailers have also been instructed that they can just
re-stock when they run out of rice supply at NFA out-lets anytime because NFA officials believe that major public markets should al-ways have retailers serving NFA rice to consumers in need. NFA rice has always been known as a basic sta-ple for poor residents in the city.
edgar Bentulan, direc-tor of NFA Region XI, also shared his concern regard-ing this matter to the media.
“I have been promoting
THe Davao City Dem-olition unit still lack the manpower
and equipment it needs for their daily operation maintaining the orderli-ness in the sidewalks in the city, an official said.
According to Ret. Col. Yusop Jimlani despite the massive demolition oper-ations in the main thor-oughfairs in the city, there are still problems on side-walk vendors especially in the ‘outskirts.’
“We really need a lot of
people. Now, I only have 12 and it is only being re-inforced by the drainage unit,” Jimlani told report-ers yesterday after the flag raising ceremony in the City Hall.
Jimlani said he re-quested the city govern-ment under the budget of his office an additional 30 personnel. He clarified that even if granted, the 30 additional manpow-er is not yet enough to cover all the sidewalks in the city from Toril to Bu-
nawan.“So, ang mangyayari
nito, ang unit actually more than 50 or more to do something,” he said.
He said that ideally, the unit needs around 200 personnel for the whole city covering dif-ferent districts in Toril, Mintal, Calinan, and Bun-wan.
“Because, we have to place people there and lot of equipments,” he said.
Jimlani hopes that by next year he will be sub-
mitting a budget proposal for his unit for an addi-tional personnel and ve-hicles which will be used for their operation.
“Ang presence kasi ngayon sa demolition, pag nakita mo nenerbyosin ka kasi alam mo’ng hindi ka nila sasantohin,” Jimlani said.
He said that there are no problems in the side-walks of city proper’s main thorough fairs any-more since his personnel keep on patrolling.
A MAGNITuDe 6.1 earthquake shook the province of Davao
Occidental on Monday after-noon, according to the Philip-pine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs).
In its bulletin, the agen-cy said the tremor occurred at 3:59 p.m. with its epicen-ter traced at 88 kilometers southeast of Don Marcelino town, Davao Occidental.
Phivolcs said the trem-or was felt at Intensity 4 in Governor Generoso town, Davao Oriental; Intensity 3 in Glan, Sarangani; Mati City, and Davao City; Intensity 2 in General Santos City, and
Intensity 1 in M’lang, North Cotabato; Tupi and Koro-nadal, South Cotabato.
The tremor, which was tectonic in origin, had a shal-low depth of 10 kilometers.
Despite the reported in-tensity, Phivolcs noted that there was no casualty nor damage reported from the quake.
However, the agency said that aftershocks are ex-pected in some of the affect-ed areas.
The Philippines lies on the Pacific Ring of Fire, where 20 to 25 earthquakes per day -- mostly impercep-tible -- are common. [PNA]
A CELEBRATION FOR PWD. Visually impaired students from Ma-a Central Elementary School participate in yesterday’s kick-off event of the 36th Na-tional Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation (NDPR) celebration at Rizal Park along San Pedro Street in Davao City. The said celebration will run until July 23. Lean Daval Jr.
FNFA, 10
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014 3NEWS
ALLIeS of President Benigno Aquino III at the House of Rep-
resentatives on Monday downplayed the decline in his popularity and trust ratings saying these will re-bound in time.
Speaker Feliciano Bel-monte Jr., in a text mes-sage to reporters, said he believes the President’s ratings will bounce back anytime.
“I am sure it (ratings) will bounce back,” he said.
eastern Samar Rep. Ben evardone, for his part, said the President should not be distracted and should not be worried by the drop in his ratings as shown in the latest Pulse Asia and Social Weather Stations (SWS) surveys.
“The drop is not alarm-ing and not cause for worry. It was expected as a trend for all sitting presidents because of the enormity of the problems confronting
our country and people raging from our territorial dispute with China to job-lessness and high prices of basic commodities,” said evardone in a text message to House reporters.
He, however, stressed that compared to past pres-idents, “President Aquino’s rating is still high.”
“The Aquino admin-istration just have to pur-sue with more vigor its campaign against corrup-tion and to have inclusive growth. The economic growth must be felt by the ordinary people,” he added.
evardone said the Pres-ident’s low trust ratings “should serve as a wake up call to some members of the Cabinet and heads of various agencies to step up their efforts to deliver ser-vices to our people.”
Recent surveys con-ducted by Pulse Asia and SWS showed that Pres-
THe united Nations Development Pro-gram (uNDP) has
poured in some Php16.2 million funding in support to the eco-tourism develop-ment program of Mt. Hami-guitan.
Department of environ-ment and Natural Resourc-es (DeNR)-XI protected area superintendent for Mt. Hamiguitan Ruel D. Colong in an interview said the funds will be used for the
development of programs in line with eco-tourism and enterprise development.
Colong said this would include among others ca-pability building that would tap the locals as they will be involved in the projects that will be implemented on the ground.
He said they will be partnering with the De-partment of Tourism (DOT) because “this will include a guided trekking or nature
adventure challenge.”Colong however em-
phasized that the program beneficiaries need to inter-nalize that the site is a pro-tected area. “Caution must be considered in order to keep intact its rich natural resource,” he said.
But he said what is good with the locals is that they already know some of the scientific names of the flora and fauna found in the prop-erty because they were also
tapped by the scientists, biologists and researchers who earlier conducted their respective studies.
Colong on the other hand said that among the priority projects that will be built on site are Visitors In-formation Centers that will be shared by the three local government units of Mati City, San Isidro and Gover-nor Generoso.
He said in the event the
VALUES FORMATION. Rene Breva (right) and Nelson Corneja of Couples for Christ (CFC) announce during this week’s edition of Kapehan sa Dabaw at The Annex Activity Center of SM City Davao
the organization’s values formation program for Overseas Filipi-no Workers (OFWs) and their families slated today in front of the mall’s VIPinoy Center. Lean Daval Jr.
FOR THE CITY’S TOURISM. City Tourism Office (CTO) chief Lisette Marques bares during yester-day’s Kapehan sa Dabaw Kapehan sa Dabaw at The Annex Activity Center of SM City Davao that
the city government of Davao is planning to push through with the plan to restore the dilapidated Little Tokyo in Mintal to boost the city’s tourism. Lean Daval Jr.
HIGHLIGHT. The male-dominated crowd enjoys every minute of Mocha Girls performance which was the highlight of the 2-day Honda Wave Alpha Road Tour held at Rizal Park along San Pedro Street in Davao City over the weekend. Lean Daval Jr.
Hamiguitan gets P16.2MPresident’s House alliesdownplay dip in ratings
ReLATIVeS of a 15-year-old boxer are seeking justice
for his death following a bout in Compostela Val-ley province earlier this month.
The teenager had looked to boxing as a way to lift his family from pov-erty until he was hit hard
in the head during a match last July 5, GMA Davao re-ported.
Investigation showed the teenager took part in a barangay boxing match in Barangay Magading in Nabunturan town in Com-postela Valley province.
After a blow to the head, he died at the Davao
Regional Hospital in Tagum City in Davao del Norte.
After finishing elemen-tary school, the boy had wanted to follow in the footsteps of Filipino boxing icon and Sarangani repre-sentative Manny Pacquiao.
His relatives are claim-ing that the referee who worked the bout did not
have the proper license, and that the barangay did not have the proper permit for the bout.
While the barangay’s officials admitted they did not secure the proper per-mit, they had asked the Mayor’s Office for a medi-cal team to respond in case of emergencies.
Teen boxer dies after match in ComVal
FHOUSE, 10
FHAMIGUITAN, 10
PReSIDeNT benigno s. aquino iii appealed to the supreme court
on monday to reconsider its decision declaring uncon-stitutional some provisions of the disbursement accel-eration program (dap)
as a way to help the fili-pino people.
in a televised address from malacanang, presi-dent aquino said the exec-utive branch will appeal the high court’s decision through filing a motion for reconsideration, as he maintained that the dap im-plementation fast-tracked the growth of the philippine economy.
”to the honorable jus-tices of the supreme court: help us help our country-
men. we ask that you review your decision, this time tak-ing into consideration the points i have raised tonight. the nation hopes for your careful deliberation and re-sponse,” he said.
”let me impress upon everyone: dap is good. our intentions, our process-es, and the results were correct,” the president stressed.
president aquino noted that dap "is an efficient way of spending the budget; it follows the law and adheres to the mandate granted to the executive branch."
"we did this to proper-ly allocate funds, and by so doing maximize the bene-fits that the people may re-
President Aquino appeals to SC: ‘Help us help our countrymen’
FAQUINO, 10
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
THe city council has set a series of public consultations over
a proposed Php2 to Php3 increase in the minimum
fare of tricycles operating within the city.
City Councilor Artu-ro Cloma, chair of the council’s committee on
transportation, said his committee will meet with various sectors in the city to determine their views and sentiments over the
proposal, which will in-crease the current Php7 minimum tricycle fare to Php9 to Php10.
He said they have
set the initial committee hearing and consultation at the city council session hall on Tuesday.
“We will consult all concerned sectors to properly guide us in de-ciding whether an in-crease in our tricycle fares is necessary at this time and how much would be the appropriate rate,” he said.
Cloma said they invit-ed leaders and represen-tatives of local transport groups, consumers, em-ployees or workers, busi-ness, religious and other concerned people’s and non-government organi-zations.
The official said the consultation will include discussions on the city’s socio-economic condi-tion, especially the impact of the rising prices of fuel and related inputs, mo-torcycle spare parts and various basic commodi-ties.
He said they will look into the current situation
of the city’s public trans-portation sector amidst these socio-economic is-sues.
Local tricycle opera-tors and drivers earlier submitted several peti-tions to the city council for a legislated increase in tricycle fares in the city’s 26 barangays.
The city’s tricycle fares were last adjusted by the city government in 2008 through Ordinance No. 3 passed by the city council.
The ordinance provid-ed for a Php1 hike in the minimum tricycle fare in the city, increasing it to Php7 from the previous Php6.
But in the last three years, local tricycle op-erators and drivers have increased the minimum fare in the city to Php8 despite the absence of an ordinance and new fare matrix from the city’s motorized transport fran-chising and regulatory board.[PNA]
4GENERAL SANTOS CITY
GENERAL SANTOS CITY GENERAL SANTOS CITY
EDGEDAVAO
SUBURBIA
IN a bid to cope with the growing demand for coffee in the domestic
and foreign markets, cof-fee industry stakeholders in Region 12 are targeting to double the area’s pro-duction and plantation ar-eas for the high-value crop within the next decade.
Danilo Centillas, high-value crops coordina-tor of the Department of Agriculture (DA)-Region 12, said the expansion of coffee plantations is ongo-ing in various parts of the region that have been iden-tified as viable areas for coffee planting or growing.
He said they specifical-ly identified around 30,000 hectares of land in the re-gion as potential expan-sion areas for coffee, which is considered as among the area’s most promising commodities due to mar-ket prospects.
The expansion sites were identified based on joint assessments conduct-ed by the agency and the Soccsksargen Coffee Alli-ance, the region’s main cof-fee industry body, he said.
“These are mostly up-land farm areas that are highly suitable for coffee planting, especially of the premium Arabica variety,” he told PNA in an interview.
A report released by DA’s Bureau of Agricultural Statistics (BAS) show that Region 12 is currently the country’s top coffee pro-ducer with an average an-nual production of around
25,000 metric tons (MT).Also known as Soccsk-
sargen, Region 12 compris-es the provinces of South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, Sarangani and North Co-tabato and the cities of General Santos, Koronadal, Tacurong, Kidapawan and Cotabato.
The region presently maintains around 25,223 hectares of coffee planta-tions that are producing as high as 1.1 MT per hectare, BAS said.
The area’s coffee plan-tations are concentrated in the upland areas of Sen-ator Ninoy Aquino, Lebak and Kalamansig towns in Sultan Kudarat, Polomolok in South Cotabato and Kidapawan City in North Cotabato.
The industry present-ly involves around 8,000 farmers who own an av-erage of three hectares of coffee plantations.
In 2011, the region posted a record yield of 28,502 MT of coffee, which accounts for 30.98 percent of the country’s annual production.
It dropped to 27,869 MT in 2012 but remained the highest among the country’s 17 regions.
Dr. Dante eugenio, president of the Soccsk-sargen Coffee Alliance, said the tag line “Coffee Capital of the Philippines” now rightfully belongs to Re-gion 12 for being the coun-try’s top coffee producer.
Amadeo town in Cavite
currently holds such title but eugenio said it’s time for the region to lay claim to it.
“Region 12 is now the country’s top producer of coffee so it deserves to claim that title,” he said.
To facilitate the planta-tion expansions, Centillas said they recently released an initial P5 million grant for the development of a 50-hectare coffee produc-tion area in the municipal-ity of Columbio in Sultan Kudarat.
He said the initiative, which is assisted by the municipal government of Columbio, mainly benefits small indigenous peoples or tribal farmers in sever-al upland barangays in the area.
The grant covers the ac-quisition of 50,000 Robus-ta coffee seedlings and oth-er necessary production inputs and requirements, he said.
“We’re targeting to start producing quality coffee beans in the area in three years,” he added.
Aside from Columbio, Centillas said they received several proposals for plan-tation expansions in areas straddled by Mt. Matutum in Polomolok and Tupi towns and portions of the upland areas in T’boli and Lake Sebu in South Cota-bato.
He said they are cur-rently evaluating the pro-posals, which will be im-plemented in partnership
with local government units and farmers’ groups.
Along with the expan-sion of the production ar-eas, he said they provide technical assistance to im-prove the production prac-tices of local coffee farmers and the quality of their pro-duce.
He said they have also linked up individual and farmer’s groups in the area to financing entities as well as buyers and the markets.
Centillas said they have provided machiner-ies and equipment for the processing of raw coffee beans into value-added products.
He said two coffee producers or farmers groups based in Sena-tor Ninoy Aquino town in Sultan Kudarat and Kidapawan City are cur-rently producing brewed coffee products through the mini coffee process-ing facilities provided by the agency.
“We’re actually en-couraging more coffee producers to go into processing to add value to their produce and to counter the impact of the fluctuating market prices of dried coffee beans,” he said.
As of Friday, the offi-cial said the market pric-es for coffee beans have dropped to P60 per kilo after reaching around P90 a kilo several months ago due to the unstable global prices. [PNA]
IN a bid to strengthen its disaster management systems, the provincial
government of South Co-tabato has launched an in-tensive training program on disaster mitigation and preparedness for the ar-ea’s barangay disaster ac-tion teams (BDAT).
Ramon Ponce de Leon, South Cotabato Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office head, said the initiative is mainly aimed to improve the capability of the es-tablished BDATs of the province’s 199 barangays in properly responding to potential disasters that might hit their areas.
He said they initially launched the training in barangays that have been identified as high risk ar-eas and highly prone to natural calamities or di-sasters.
These comprise baran-gays that previously expe-rienced severe floods and landslides as well as those located near the two active volcanoes -- Mts. Parker and Matutum -- straddling the province’s 10 towns and lone city, he said.
“Our goal is to make our BDATs better prepared in times of disasters and related crisis situations to avert possible tragedies,” Ponce de Leon said.
The official said the lo-
cal government has initial-ly released Php1.7 million to facilitate the conduct of the trainings.
He said South Cotabato Gov. Daisy Avance-Fuentes has committed an addi-tional Php1.3 million to complete the training of all 199 BDATs in the province before the end of the year.
Ponce de Leon said they have clustered the province’s barangays for the implementation of the training program, which focuses on equipping BDAT members with the basic knowledge and skills in responding to disasters.
A program briefer said the BDAT training aims to train capable and motivated volun-teers by providing them with appropriate knowl-edge, skills, attitude and equipment for the effec-tive management of di-saster preparedness and response programs in their barangays.
He said training mod-ules include first aid, emergency care, basic life support, rescue skills and proper use of emer-gency equipment and kits.
“It includes simula-tion exercises on possi-ble calamities that might affect our barangays,” he said. [PNA]
GenSan sets public consultations on proposed hike in trike fares
Region 12 gears up for massive expansion of coffee plantations South Cotabato launches training program for barangay disaster teams
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
The city government of Davao is planning to push through with
the City Tourism Office’s proposal to reconstruct Lit-tle Tokyo in Mintal, Tugbok district to boost city tour-ism.
The planning and de-velopment of the Japanese cultural heritage mapping project will be funded by Tourism Infrastructure and enterprise Zone Authority (TIeZA).
“We have already sub-mitted the project to TIeZA for their consideration in terms of planning for Lit-tle Tokyo. When we get it all planned out, there will hopefully be a program of works within the year. Al-though TIeZA already has a program for implementa-tion, it did not work out. So, this will come out as a new project for them,” Lisette Marques, Davao City Tour-ism Officer, said during the weekly Kapehan sa Dabaw at the SM City Davao on Monday.
During the World War II, Mintal was recognized as Little Tokyo because it was where the Japanese set-tled down during the pre-war period. In hope for a new history landmark, the Davao City Tourism Office plans to restore and reha-bilitate the site to attract
tourists.The project is expect-
ed to be completed and launched by August in time for the yearly period where most Japanese tourists visit the city but TIeZA needs to conduct a feasibility study for the project to ensure a proper initial development plan.
According to Marques, it is also possible for the local government to re-structure establishments patterned with Japanese culture as part of their plan in developing Little Tokyo. This may be done in coop-eration with the owners of the existing establishments located at Tugbok district.
“Why not? If the own-ers are willing to make it look like a Japanese village then it’s possible. One of the sites there is owned by the Dakudao family where it used to have a hospital but it is not being used as a residence right now. We’re hoping we could seek a dia-logue with the family if they can offer it as a site for the Japanese heritage tour,” she explained.
The City Tourism Office has prepared two layers of maps for the previous Lit-tle Tokyo and the current one. The TIeZA still needs to inform them which map will be used for their plans
of restoration and rehabili-tation.
If the project gets ap-proved, a total of 20 fami-lies of informal settlers who live in the area need to be re-located to give way for the Japanese cultural heri-tage sites.
“Since Barangay Cap-tain Ramon Bargamento is very much an advocate and a flag-bearer of Little Tokyo,
he has initially informed in-formal settlers in the area that they may have to move out. They know where the captain stands and under-stand how Little Tokyo could positively affect the community,” Marques said.
The City Tourism offi-cers are currently trying to convince Japanese tourists that “there is more to see” in Davao City and hoping
that the Japanese Develop-ment Council can see their thrust to create an experi-ence not just for pilgrimage tours.
“We’re studying the entire tourism experience of those who come over for pilgrimage because when they visit Davao, they feel that it is such a hassle for the need to stay one night in Manila due to the con-
necting flights. Aside from that, since they have seen Little Tokyo already, the repeat visits are not real-ized. So they feel like there is nothing to see anymore and leave right away. We are targetting the private sectors, the Japanese cham-ber and populating all those Japanese-owned business-es that will compliment this kind of tour,” Marques said.
5EDGEDAVAO
THE ECONOMYRestoration, rehab plans for ‘Little Tokyo’
NEW WAVE. Lemuel Buenaflor, unit head of advertising department of Honda Philippines, introduces the all-new Honda Wave Alpha models during the company’s Road Tour held at Rizal Park along San Pedro Street in Davao City over the weekend. Lean Daval Jr.
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 20146 THE ECONOMY
THe Philippines has pushed seven sec-tors for investment
promotion in Israel which include public-private part-nership projects, manu-facturing, energy, tourism, agribusiness, mining, and oil and gas, data obtained from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) showed.
The country also eyes to strengthen trade relation with Israel as it continues to seek market for products such as tuna, fresh and pre-served fruits, biscuits, bev-erages, juices, and noodles in Israel.
The data showed that the country has increasing
trade transactions with Israel as well as in invest-ments.
In 2012, bilateral trade between the Philippines and Israel was posted at uSD 165.24 million with ex-ports revenue of uSD 72.76 million and imports bill of uSD 92.47. Balance of trade in goods (BOT-G) then reg-istered at uSD 19.71 mil-lion.
But in 2013, total trade between the two countries recorded a total of uSD 177.12 million with ex-ports of uSD 84.07 million and imports of uSD 93.05 million. The Philippines has managed to decrease its trade deficit to USD 8.98
million in the said year.Israel’s investments to
the Philippines last year also increased fourfold to Php 30.01 million over a year ago of Php 5.96 mil-lion.
Israel’s recent invest-ments in the country are NCO Philippines Clark, Inc. which is a call center com-pany and is registered in the Board of Investments (BOI) in 2012; S&L Services Inc., an information technolo-gy-business process man-agement firm registered in Philippine economic Zone Authority (PeZA) in 2013; Mediamind Tech-nologies Philippines, Inc. which is also registered in
PeZA in 2013; Truelogic Online Solutions, Inc., an outsourcing-software and system development firm registered in PeZA in 2012; Diafox47, Inc., a PeZA-reg-istered firm in 2009; and Cinnovation, Inc., an IT-BPM firm registered in PEZA in 2005.
Meanwhile, the Israel embassy in Manila will be holding Homeland Security Business Forum in Makati City Tuesday as a prepara-tion of the planned partici-pation of the Philippines in the 3rd International Con-ference on Homeland Secu-rity in Tel Aviv, Israel from November 9 to 12, 2014. [PNA]
AFTeR the sudden surge in prices of garlic in Metro Ma-
nila these past weeks, its cost went down from a minimum of P20 a kilo, the Department of Agriculture (DA) said on Monday.
Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala, in a press conference, revealed that from P280 to P300 per kilo, prices of garlic are now P200 and below.
In Pasay City Public Market, Marikina City Market Zone, and Muñoz Market in Quezon City, prices of imported garlic have decreased from P280 to P150 per kilo this week.
The prevailing price at the New Dagonoy Market in Manila is at P150 per kilo; while garlic prices in the Viajero Market and
Muntinlupa Public Market are sold at P180 per kilo.
In Pasig City Mega Market, the price dropped from P280 to P200 per kilo while the Marikina Pub-lic Market dropped from P300 to P280 per kilo.
Prices of garlic in Que-zon City, meanwhile, also went down in Common-wealth Market, from P300 to P180 per kilo; Mega Q Mart, from P280 to P200; and New Arayat Market, from P280 to P200 a kilo.
In the Polo Market in Valenzuela, prices went down from P300 to P100 per kilo this week while in Mandaluyong, prices decreased from P320 last week to P200 per kilo.
Alcala has assured the government will make gar-lic more affordable, while
at the same time, urged consumers to patronize the locally grown variety.
At present, the DA is enforcing measures to pro-tect the resurgence of the local variety.
Alcala said the sudden increase in garlic prices served as a "wake-up call" to protect local produc-tion amid the suspected manipulation of prices by unscrupulous traders.
The DA has also tight-ened the importation guidelines to prevent the unbridled entry of import-ed garlic into the local mar-ket now that it is starting to make progress.
Farmers’ organiza-tions are now required to submit a board resolution allowing them to import garlic and a detailed list
of their members which shall include the farmers’ names, addresses and the location of their farms.
Importers are also mandated to show their financial capability by sub-mitting a bank statement, income tax returns, and the necessary papers of the accredited DA ware-house where they will store their imported garlic.
experts from the Bu-reau of Plant Industry (BPI) are now teaching farmers about good agri-cultural practices on garlic.
Proper cultural man-agement in garlic, from its fertilization, irrigation, pest and disease manage-ment to its harvest and processing are now be-ing taught garlic farmers. [PNA]
RICe can withstand abnormal weather conditions given ap-
propriate technologies and environments, according to the Philippine Rice Re-search Institute (PhilRice).
“Rice can actually sur-vive disasters. We just need more R&D (research and development) to contin-ue to improve our outputs and bring technologies to farmers. Matching these technologies to suitable environments is the key,” PhilRice executive director eufemio T. Rasco Jr. said.
Rasco also said that the natural calamities being experienced in the country have only become a con-straint due to lack of effi-cient infrastructure, specif-ically shipping.
“Our neighboring coun-
tries have also had their share of floods, drought, pests, among other chal-lenges that confronted their rice production. But they managed to move on be-cause of consistent govern-ment intervention,” he said.
While it is true that cer-tain areas are more suitable for rice than the others, Rasco stressed that rice is a very flexible crop and that technologies and strate-gies are continuously being developed to address the problem.
He said that PhilRice has been developing varieties that can withstand flooding, drought, and salinity.
"We are currently work-ing on varieties that can survive a 37-degree Cel-sius temperature, among other breakthroughs. We
take breaking productivity plateau as our task,” Rasco said.
The PhilRice official also said that the Palayabangan challenge participated by individual farmers, private companies, and PhilRice showed that yields of 10 tons per hectare (t/ha) at a cost of less than P5/kg during the dry season and 7 t/ha at P7/kg during the wet season is attainable.
"This is competitive with that of the world`s most efficient rice produc-ers like China and India," he said.
He also said that there is a wide range of options the farmers can resort into, if "we push for exploring our rice environment."
PhilRice studies proved that the rice environment
can sustain other crops such as mungbean and veg-etables, poultry, livestock, and even fish.
Without the rice crop, vegetable growing will have problems with soil-borne diseases while some feeds for poultry and fish and fer-tilizer for rice, like Azolla, will not thrive.
Also, rice farming by-products like bran, rice hull, and straw are becom-ing widely used for feeds, raw materials for indus-tries, and for energy gener-ation.
“We just need to focus on rice R&D and the local rice production industry so as not to deprive ourselves of these by-products and other rice-based incomes which are equally valuable,” Rasco added. [PNA]
THe Department of Agriculture is set to undertake
initiatives aimed at pro-moting greater market integration and more inclusive value chains to allow smallholder food producers achieve more meaningful productivity and income growth, as the government noted a significant reduction in poverty incidence among fisherfolk.
Agriculture Secre-tary Proceso Alcala said on Friday that the gov-ernment hopes to com-plete at least 10 trading centers this year, and 15 more by the following year. Two of these facil-ities have already been opened in the past two months – one in Vinzons, Camarines Norte on May 14 and another one in urdaneta City, Pangasin-an on July 9.
DA is also expected to inaugurate before year-end a P400-million mod-ern wholesale trading and processing facility for vegetables and fruits — dubbed as Agri-Pinoy Trading Center – in La Trinidad, Benguet, con-sidered as the country’s ‘salad bowl.’ Due for com-pletion before yearend, it will be the biggest and most modern agricultur-al wholesale trading and processing center in the country, Alcala said.
In fisheries, the gov-ernment will construct 252 landing sites in 45 provinces across the country in 2015 alone, Director Asis Perez of the DA-Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources said.
Perez said these landing sites will be equipped with cold stor-age facilities and related equipment to allow peo-ple to buy directly from there.
Such facilities are in addition to the 50 fish ports that DA-BFAR aims to finish by the end of President Benigno S. Aquino III’s term.
DA-BFAR will also aggressively promote the establishment of val-ue-adding enterprises in the seaweed industry, as well as in the aquasil-viculture program that it implements together with 61 state universi-ties and colleges.
Aquasilviculture in-volves the growing of fish and other aquat-ic organisms within a mangrove area.
“In all, these invest-ments will focus on linking food producers directly with markets and teaching them to add value to their pro-duce so they earn higher profits,” he said.
The Philippine Sta-tistics Authority report-ed earlier this week that poverty among small-time fishing families has decreased by 2.1 percent. From 41.3 per-cent in 2009, the pover-ty incidence among the fishing families dropped significantly to 39.2 per-cent in 2012.
PSA also identified other four basic sectors with higher poverty in-cidence than the general population as farmers, children, self-employed, unpaid family workers and women. [PNA]
PHL cites 7 sectors pushed for investment promotion in Israel
THe World Bank Group (WBG) is pre-paring an additional
uSD 62-million worth of fund to areas hit by super typhoon 'Yolanda', reaf-firming its support to the Philippine government's rehabilitation efforts.
WBG President Jim Yong Kim arrived in the country Monday to vis-it communities affected by typhoon 'Yolanda' in which he announced that the WBG is preparing more funds to help 'Yolan-da'-stricken areas.
Kim said the WBG is set
to submit the uSD 62-mil-lion worth Philippine Rural Development Project to its Board of executive Direc-tors next month.
The said project aims to increase incomes of farm-ers and fishermen as well as repair a total of 230 ki-lometers farm-to-market roads in the Visayas.
The WBG clarified that the uSD 62 million fund is part of the uSD 508.25 million project designed to raise rural incomes and increase productivity of farmers and fishermen na-tionwide. [PNA]
DA to intensify support for value chain-oriented enterprises
WB Group prepares new USD 62-M funding for ‘Yolanda’ victims
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014 7EDGEDAVAO
ENVIRONMENT
SeNATOR Loren Le-garda stressed the importance of the
country’s protected ar-eas in improving food security and addressing poverty.
Legarda, Chair of the Senate Committee on environment and Nat-ural Resources, said on Monday that protected areas are characterized by thriving biodiversity and have unique features that support agriculture, water supply and other
economic activities. “establishing pro-
tected areas is not only an environmental issue, but also a gut issue. It is crucial to food security, water security and pov-erty alleviation because these areas are rich sources of basic resourc-es,” she explained
The Senator noted that many protected ar-eas are vital source of freshwater, which is im-portant in agriculture. A study of the International
union for Conservation of Nature (IuCN) showed that agriculture uses as much as 50% of fresh-water in many countries and up to 90% in some developing countries.
Meanwhile, estab-lishing marine protected areas allows for the full development of under-water species and recov-ery of the area, which re-sult in replenishment of marine resources.
Legarda said that there are 113 areas in
the country declared through Presidential proclamations as pro-tected areas under the National Integrated Pro-tected Areas System (NI-PAS) Act. However, only 13 have proceeded to be legislated as such.
The Agusan Marsh, Aliwagwag Falls and Apo Island are among the 100 areas included in the proposed Protect-ed Areas Declaration Act filed by Legarda.
The Agusan Marsh
holds around 15% of the country’s fresh wa-ter resources. Parts of the marsh are used for traditional fishponds and rice paddies.
The Aliwagwag Falls in Davao Oriental supports about 17,000 hectares of rice land.
In Apo Island in Negros Oriental, the establishment of a ma-rine sanctuary helped replenish fish stocks in the island, thus result-ing in improved fish
catch in the surround-ing areas of the marine sanctuary. It has also become a popular snor-keling and dive spot.
“These are but a few of more than a hundred protected areas in the country and each has significant contribu-tions to their respective communities and to the nation as a whole. Leg-islation for the remain-ing 100 protected areas must be approved to ensure improved con-servation programs and appropriate funding,” said Legarda.
“As stewards of earth’s resources, we are responsible for the sustainable use of our natural resources. We need to work together to conserve and, if pos-sible, rehabilitate the natural resources that have been damaged by our irresponsible acts. We have to work dou-ble time because the protection of our envi-ronment is also crucial in our effort towards building resilience and adapting to the chang-ing climate,” she added.
The proposed Pro-tected Areas Declara-tion Act under Senate Bill No. 1901 is current-ly under review by the Committee on environ-ment and Natural Re-sources. The next com-mittee hearing is sched-uled on July 16, 2014 at the Senate.
Protected areas crucial to food security, poverty alleviation
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 20148 EDGEDAVAO
VANTAGE
Full accounting
OLIVIA D. VELASCOGeneral Manager
Columnists: MA. TERESA L. UNGSON • EDCER C. ESCUDERO • AURELIO A. PEñA • ZHAUN ORTEGA • BERNADETTE “ADDIE” B. BORBON • MARY ANN “ADI” C. QUISIDO • LEANDRO B. DAVAL SR., • NIKKI GOTIANSE-TAN • NICASIO ANGELO AGUSTIN • EMILY ZEN CHUA • CARLOS MUNDA Economic Analyst: ENRICO “GICO” G. DAYANGIRANG • JONALLIER M. PEREZ
Printed by Zion Accuprint Publishing Inc. Door 14 ALCREJ Building,
Quirino Avenue, 8000, Davao City, PhilippinesTel: (082) 301-6235
CAGAYAN DE ORO MARKETING OFFICELEIZEL A. DELOSO | Marketing ManagerUnit 6, Southbank Plaza Velez-Yacapin Sts.Cagayan de Oro CityTel: (088) 852-4894
RICHARD C. EBONAAdvertising Specialist
SOLANI D. MARATASFinance
EDGEDAVAOProviding solutions to a seamless global village.
ANTONIO M. AJEROEditor in Chief
OLIVIA D. VELASCOGeneral Manager
Columnists: CARLOS MUNDA • MA. TERESA L. UNGSON • EDCER C. ESCUDERO • AURELIO A. PEñA • MARY ANN “ADI” C. QUISIDO • LEANDRO B. DAVAL SR., • NICASIO ANGELO AGUSTIN • VIDA MIA VALVERDE • Economic Analysts: ENRICO “GICO” G. DAYANGIRANG • JONALLIER M. PEREZ • Lifestyle Columnists: BAI FAUZIAH FATIMA SINSUAT AMBOLODTO • MEGHANN STA. INES • NIKKI GOTIANSE-TAN
LEANDRO S. DAVAL JR. JOSEPH LAWRENCE P. GARCIA Photography Contributing Photographer
ARLENE D. PASAJECartoons
KENNETH IRVING K. ONGCreative SolutionsPrinted by Zion Accuprint Publishing Inc.
Door 14 ALCREJ Building,Quirino Avenue, 8000, Davao City, Philippines
CAGAYAN DE ORO MARKETING OFFICELEIZEL A. DELOSO | Marketing ManagerUnit 6, Southbank Plaza Velez-Yacapin Sts.Cagayan de Oro CityTel: (088) 852-4894
GENERAL SANTOS CITY MARKETING OFFICEFLOREnCE S. ViLLARin Marketing Specialistc/o PZ Villarin MarketingSalvani St., Oringo Brgy. City HeightsTel: (083) 303-2215
MANILA MARKETING OFFICEANGELICA R. GARCIA | Marketing ManagerBlk. 1, Lot 10, La Mar Townhomes, Apitong St.,Marikina Heights, Marikina City Tel: (02) 942-1503
NEILWIN JOSEPH L. BRAVOManaging Editor
GREGORIO G. DELIGEROAssociate Editor
RICHARD C. EBONAMarketing Supervisor
SOLANI D. MARATASFinance
AQUILES Z. ZONIOCorrespondent
ARMANDO B. FENEQUITO JR.CHENEEN R. CAPON / VANNAH S. ANG
Reporters
JOCELYN S. PANESDirector of Sales
AGUSTIN V. MIAGAN JRCirculation
PHILIPPINE PRESS INSTITUTEthe national association of newspapers
EDITORIAL
NOW that the Supreme Court has de-clared the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) unconstitutional, the
next move is to ask for the full accounting of the DAP projects. In fact, whether or not DAP is constitutional, government is obligat-ed to account for it to the people, whom the President loves to call his “bosses” and the real owners of the money.
We are talking here about P137.3 billion, 9 percent of which went to lawmakers. Ac-counting is the best argument to support the claim of President Aquino that DAP was wisely spent and not stolen. It is said that DAP projects benefited the country. Account-ing may not totally prove it right away since showing benefits of a project takes time. But
proving that the money was spent on the in-tended purpose or purposes and not stolen by the implementors may be easier and fast-er done.
The President is being asked to release the complete list of the DAP projects and reveal how the funds were spent by both his allies and detractors. If he has nothing to hide, this is not difficult to do.
As of yesterday, concerned Filipinos were waiting for the President’s response with baited breath.
As of this writing last night, there was breaking, albeit still unconfirmed, news that the list will be made available in the gov-ernment’s website for everybody to see and scrutinize. This is, indeed, good news, if true.
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
AQUILES Z. ZONIOCorrespondent
VANTAGE POINTS 9EDGEDAVAO
P-Noy’s last two minutes
Unwanted flaunt
A FeW days after Benigno Aqui-no III took his oath as the coun-try’s 14th president in June
30, 2010, a lady seer soothsaid that P-Noy will not finish his six-year term.
Well, it looks like the lady fortune teller hit the nail right on the head as the controversial DAP (Disbursement Acceleration Program) issue wors-ens and threatens P-Noy’s rule. each passing day since the Supreme Court killed the DAP, the cry for P-Noy’s head gets louder, angrier and more bitter.
As for me, I see two possible sce-narios that could take place before the year 2014 makes its exit:
1) P_Noy is booted out of office by massive people action,
2) P-Noy makes a graceful exit by doing a Nixon – resign with an apolo-getic smile, not an arrogant frown.
FLASHBACK OF uS POLITICS: In 1972, Richard Nixon, fearing im-peachment and removal from office after being implicated in the “Water-gate affair”, resigned on August 9th.
The “Watergate affair” referred to the break-in and electronic bugging of the Democratic National Convention in the Watergate building in Wash-
ington, D.C. It was the worst polit-ical scandal in uS history. Thirty Nixon officials were found guilty of breaking the law.
N i x o n escaped im-p e a c h m e n t by resigning. He was, however, im-mediately pardoned by his successor Gerald ford. Criminal charges were no longer necessary because of the pardon.
P-Noy can avoid a shameful ouster by resigning. It is a certainty that his legitimate successor, Vice President Binay, will promptly grant him abso-lute pardon. Binay, as we all know, is a true-blue Cory boy.
It will be “all is well that ends well”, with P-Noy. everybody is happy especially Jejomar, who would then be addressed as His excellency, Pres-ident Binay!.
oOoThe DAP issue has reached the
Last Two Minutes for P-Noy and his gang. They better stop fooling the people with patent lies, cover-ups of policy blunders and erring subalterns and favorite appointees.
oOoAntonio Trillanes IV is slowly
but surely becoming another Grin-go Honasan. Both are former rebel boys who imagined themselves as the quintessential “savior of democracy.”
Like Gringo, Antonio is a two-term senator. Like Gringo, Antonio is an in-tellectual dwarf who has never shown intelligent understanding of the true functions of a legislator, and has nev-er demonstrated credible grasp of sensitive national issues. Both are still political “babes in the woods.”
And the great danger that may dawn upon this nation is that Antonio wants to be vice president or presi-dent in 2016. If and when that hap-pens, it will be the biggest political di-saster to ever happen in the country.
It is our duty not just to vote, but to choose only the deserving candi-dates during elections. Morons have no business, much less right, to hold office higher than barangay kaga-wad.
INTeRLOCKING DRAWBACKS – The Aquino administration’s confi-dence was high that it could duck
the gut-wrenching contractions plagu-ing the country. Not long ago, buoyant government economists and financial analysts firmly believe the Philippines stood a good chance of engineering an economic “soft-landing” through tight monetary policies.
And with good reasons the Aquino leadership is pleased with the country’s economic trend these days. under Pres-ident Benigno Aquino III’s stewardship, the country has so far weathered the regional economic storm with a stable currency and economic growth, but not so much in the political front. Analysts say the present dispensation scored high in the economic front but “the gains have not trickled down to the people.”
Given the peso appreciation the past several days, exports are big changed in uS dollars while increasing imports demonstrate strong domestic demand. The peso performed relatively well in the latest currency exchange rate – P43.40 to $1. Regrettably, the unwant-ed flaunt must sound hollow to some factions like the political adversaries, some private economists, militant alli-ances and progressive transport, labor and farmers’ organizations brandishing red-colored flags and placards at recent street demonstrations across the coun-try.
Indeed, government detractors, as their wont, remain skeptical that the Aquino leadership has the political will to carry out socio-economic and political reforms citing the country’s prevailing intermeshing problems. The never-end-ing political rigmarole surrounding the
PDAF and DAP fund controversy is where all the energies of our law-makers go that resulted to stalling the country’s progress.
On their allegations is a plea in the form of a command that government instead of wasting time, money and effort in dealing with the fund mess must help unemployed peo-ple find jobs, maintain softer oil prices, efficient delivery of basic social services and total crackdown on widespread corruption and smuggling in all levels of public life. Not content with what gov-ernment has been doing they continu-ously pester and sully the Aquino lead-ers, and worse, branding it as anti-poor and anti-masses.
unfazed by the brickbats, govern-ment planners and managers say the economic fundamentals are rising fur-ther and faster as expected. Prudent policies and sound rudiments continue because of tight currency control that protects the peso and vast domestic re-sources to fuel the industry. Although the growth will be a bit slow, govern-ment think tanks believe the economy will bottom out by year end and even beyond.
Their forecast springs from govern-ment index of leading business indica-tors that the country’s trade numbers recently have been very encouraging. Most importantly the stable peso is
helping the economy and growing as fast as people had anticipated. The government forecasts a fourth quarter Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of at least 7% while it remained at 6 percent at the moment. The positive economic growth bounces from the country’s reli-ance on trade, property market, exports and construction boom.
Of course, the higher GDP growth makes the Philippines one of the fastest growing economies among the South-east Asian nations. But with unemploy-ment as predicted by economists and fi-nancial experts to approach 30% in the coming months and years, they say the country needs at least 7% GDP growth to avert dangerous levels of joblessness. If there are bright spots in the country’s economy, then government and the business sector are in a position to ex-ploit them to its advantage.
unfortunately, the same is true in reverse. exporters lately are threatened as the country’s current peso peg to the uS dollar has tremendously hurt com-petitiveness and domestic demand has been chilled by consumers’ fear of mas-sive unemployment. The most troubling development is the financial status of several thousand of OFWs where their dollar remittances could also be direct-ly affected if the currency exchange rate fluctuates that would bolster the dollar.
Political detractors are putting some fangs to their oft-repeated pronounce-ments that government has engaged in double talk while the marginal sector in society continues to suffer from official negligence and indifference. They like-wise indicate that there is no authority in charge that will watch and protect the people’s interest.
I WAS scan-ning the news to-
day and I ran across a sto-ry about the government of Canada’s P32-million aid for Mind-anao, which according to the Canadi-an Ambas-
sador will be used to “ensure that the conflict-affected families in the region will have access to improved tempo-rary shelter conditions, access to safe drinking water, improved access to san-itation and hygiene facilities, as well as improved nutrition.” (http://asianjour-nal.com/news/canada-gives-addition-al-php-32-million-in-humanitarian-as-sistance-to-mindanao/)
While I am sure the effort will be well appreciated by the beneficiaries of the program, I was a bit surprised that as-sistance for education was not included in the list of projects that will be funded from this donation.
Just to be clear, this is not at all meant to look this Canadian gift horse in the mouth. God knows we need as much horses (and more than a few king’s men) to put this humpty-dumpty coun-try back together again. Rather, mine is just an observation - with maybe a touch of wishful thinking - about the need to go deeper than portable shelters and po-table water if we truly want to maintain the peace in this part of the Philippines.
In this regard, I believe that educa-tion is the community’s most powerful tool in ensuring that whatever gains made from the recent signing of the Peace Agreement will not be lost in just one generation.
This is particularly acute in those ar-eas where, previous to the current thaw-ing of relations between the government and their erstwhile adversaries, the only lessons being learned were those that were taught from the barrel of a gun. The decades-long span of the conflict ensured that a whole generation of Min-danaoans have known no other reality than things blowing up around them.
What I find even more curious about the oversight is that in almost all west-ern societies post-trauma psychological intervention has become a standard ap-plication for any sort of violent experi-ence. especially those involving minors.
In this light, it seems obvious that there would be a strong need for some sort of processing mechanism to be set-up by the government and aid agencies to help those who lived through the or-deal cope with whatever demons they hold inside. This is where I believe a strong re-education program would have been invaluable in transforming the socio-cultural landscape of these areas. The children would be the most fertile ground for planting the seeds of long-term peace and stability.
Of course this isn’t to say that we do not need to physically rebuild com-munities damaged or destroyed by the conflict, but we also have to pay close attention to the underlying state of mind of the people. There is an opportunity here - and a lesson - mending Mindanao will take a lifetime, require Herculean ef-forts, and demand saint-like dedication and sacrifice from all those involved. Cosmetic solutions and templated ideas will not be enough, we need to innovate.
Admittedly we are just in the ear-ly stages of getting started - we haven’t even reached the starting line yet - but things do seem to be looking up. The good news is that there is much hope that the momentum will continue and the promise of this land and its people will finally be delivered.
CORReCTION: The title of our col-umn’s topic in the July 13-14, 2014 edition of edge Davao should be “Rush towards 2016,” not “I know it’s been a while, but baka magamit ninyo pa ito.”Sorry for the misprint.
Mending Mindanao
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 201410 NEWSCabbie...FFROM 1PSSCC with the police, complainant, Mr. and Mrs. Randy Campos to check the CCTV footages that could prove the claim of Dizon that his taxi unit he was driven reached the Hill Crest Subdivision. But, Diez stated the complainant failed to secure a copy of the footage that night.
“The reason is clear. What they saw on the CCTV footages were consistent with my version of event,” Diez stressed.
Diez admitted that he conveyed Dizon on the evening of June 7 in the air-port but he denied that he dropped the complainant to Hill Crest Subdivision.
He stated that he picked Dizon at the arrival area of the airport and told him to convey him going to Bu-hangin. Then, Dizon asked him if there is a lotto outlet near Milan but he answered that it was already past 8:00 p.m.
Diez said that when he noticed that Dizon was still undecided where he would go. He asked the complainant if he would in-form the airport security in the exit that he would drop Dizon to Pag-ibig homes in Buhangin and the latter agreed.
“I was hoping that I could return immediately return to the airport and pick up passengers from the same flight without hav-ing to fall in line again,” Diez said.
The accused said that his reason of his request is to allow him to make up for the lost time and income since the Dizon asked to be dropped only in Buhangin which is a short distance drive from airport.
“As part of the standard procedure, the airport se-curity personnel asked the complainant for his sur-name when we reached the exit area of the airport. The complainant’s Dizon.” After that, I informed the officer that the complainant’s des-tination would be at Pag-
ibig Homes, Buhangin only,” Diez stated.
Diez said that Dizon did not fall asleep or become unconscious when they reached the regional office of Commission on Audit.
“Neither did I notice him to be sleepy or acting strangely just like mot pas-sengers, he stayed quiet as I drove along Diversion Road,” he said.
Diez stated that he re-called that the complainant did not tell the driver on his specific destination when they passed by NHA Bu-hangin.
“I was anticipating that he would instruct me to stop my vehicle anytime,” he said.
He stated that when they reached Balamban Liempo along Driversion Road, the complainant told him to stop few me-ters away from the said establishment. Then, Diez pressed his taxi meter which posted a fare reading of P89 and Dizon gave him P100.
Diez stated that he asked the complainant if it would be fine if the change given to him will be short by P2 since he only had P9. The complainant agreed with it.
He stated that after the complainant received that change, the latter alight-ed from the taxi unit and closed the door. Diez said that the Dizon did not have any baggage during that night except for a small sling bag.
“I did not mind where he was headed thereafter. I was more concerned of the vehicles approaching my rear, since I will be execut-ing a u-turn to go back to the airport,” he said.
“That was the last time I saw the complainant on the day of the alleged incident,” he added.
He stipulated that at around 8:20 p.m., he reached the airport en-trance and noticed that there already six taxi units parked at the station area.
this advocacy to NFA rice retailers for the last sev-eral weeks. We emphasize that your stores need to always be ready to serve consumers from the time you open until you close, Monday to Sunday. Sell-ers need to be present in their stores at all times,” he said.
“While I was inspect-ing a public market be-fore, I found out that
some NFA retailers close their stores during noon to maybe eat lunch or something. It would prob-ably make you wonder why NFA rice retailers close while commercial rice retailers stay open for noon when NFA rice is much more in demand,”
To address this issue, NFA officials developed a reward-punishment in-centive system. Allocation
for NFA rice will be main-tained or increased if re-tailers stay open during the suggested hours. If re-tailers do otherwise, allo-cation will be decreased.
NFA rice is available in the market for the current price of P27.00 to P32.00 depending on the vari-ety. NFA rice varieties are well-milled, strong regu-lar-milled, regular-milled, iron-fortified, re-milled
iron-fortified, and import-ed rice. The NFA Region XI currently has 80,000 sacks of rice in store for retailers.
There are a total of 600 NFA rice retailers in the region. The partici-pation of NFA in the total rice requirement in the region is 23 percent. One consumer can purchase a maximum of 5 kilos of NFA rice per day.
NFA...
House...
Hamiguitan...South...
FFROM 2
FFROM 3
FFROM 3
FFROM 3trainings.
He said South Cotabato Gov. Daisy Avance-Fuen-tes has committed an ad-ditional Php1.3 million to complete the training of all 199 BDATs in the province before the end of the year.
Ponce de Leon said they have clustered the prov-ince’s barangays for the im-plementation of the training program, which focuses on equipping BDAT members with the basic knowledge and skills in responding to disasters.
A program briefer said the BDAT training aims to train capable and motivat-ed volunteers by provid-ing them with appropriate knowledge, skills, attitude and equipment for the ef-fective management of di-saster preparedness and response programs in their barangays.
He said training mod-ules include first aid,
emergency care, basic life support, rescue skills and proper use of emergency equipment and kits.
“It includes simulation exercises on possible ca-lamities that might affect our barangays,” he said.
Ponce de Leon said they will provide the BDATs who would complete the train-ing program with a spine board and first aid or emer-gency kits.
The provincial govern-ment pushed for the cre-ation and activation of the BDATs, which comprise 20 members, two years ago as part for its enhanced disas-ter management program.
The creation of the BDATs is based on the pro-visions of Republic Act 10121 or the Philippine Di-saster Risk Reduction and Management Act of 2010, which paved the way for a more dynamic, pro-active approach in empowering
CARE. A young student from Bolton Elementary School who is suffering from mental impairment is being taken care of by his companion who appears to be his father while attending yesterday’s kick-off event of the 36th Nation-
al Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation (NDPR) celebration at Rizal Park along San Pedro Street in Davao City. Lean Daval Jr.
ident Aquino’s ratings dropped to the lowest levels since he assumed office in 2010.
MAGDALO party-list
Rep. Francisco Ashley Acedillo, meanwhile, urged the chief executive to continue implementing more pro-people reforms.
“I’d rather see that President Aquino con-tinues his good policies and programs, and with the two-year remainder
of his term, find renewed vigor to govern the coun-try with integrity and decisiveness,” he said. [PNA]
site will be opened to vis-itors, they (visitors) must undergo first comprehen-sive briefing about the site giving emphasis on prohibi-tive acts while on site.
He said they already set the carrying capaci-ty at the mossy forest for only 30 heads at a given time.
“The mountain range harbors a diversity of plant and animal species which include species that exist only in the Philip-pines, only in Mindanao Island and only in Mt. Ha-
miguitan,” he said.He said it shelters rare,
critically endangered and economically important plant and animal species that are of significant val-ue to science and conser-vation.
He said the large ex-panse of natural tropical bonsai forest that crowns its crest embodies nature’s fight for survival and illus-trates man’s critical role in its fragile success.
Based on the previous study, he said some 246 plant species are found
in the ecosystem, 44 of which are endemic. But-terflies (22 spp.) abound in this ecosystem despite the rarity of other fauna.
He said noteworthy is the presence of the glob-ally threatened dipthero-carp trees Shorea guiso and S. polysperma.
He also said that there are 957 plant species which include 723 angio-sperms, 27 conifers, 164 ferns and allies, 17 moses, 13 liverworts, 13 lichens, and an undetermined number of fungi species.
Total fauna species is at 423 including 15 non-fly-ing mammals, 11 flying mammals, 108 birds, 33 reptiles, 18 frogs, 142 but-terflies, 31 dragonflies and damselflies, 46 spiders, four earthworms, and 15 nematodes.
Overall, he said the property provides critical habitats to a total of 1,380 species wherein 341 spe-cies are endemic.
A continuing study is ongoing on site for other insects including spiders, he added. [PNA]
Aquino...FFROM 3ceive," he stressed.
the president cited the backlog in the number of classrooms needed to meet the growing number of stu-dents nationwide.
through the use of dap funds, he said, the govern-ment was able to eliminate the backlog of 66,800 class-rooms.
president aquino also cited the sitio electrification program of the government which was successfully im-
plemented through the effi-cient use of savings.
"through dap, in 2012, php1.264 billion were made available to electrify a total of 6,163 sitios," he noted.
the chief executive re-iterated section 39 of the 1987 administrative code of the philippines that clear-ly allowed for the use of savings to fund government programs and projects.
he cited the law’s pro-
vision allowing for the use of savings: “except as otherwise provided in the general appropriations act, any savings in the regular appropriations authorized in the general appropria-tions act for programs and projects of any depart-ment, office or agency, may, with the approval of the president, be used to cover a deficit in any other item of the regular appropria-tions…”
president aquino said such law openly gives the president the power to transfer savings to other projects.
“it does not limit the transfer to only one de-partment or branch of gov-ernment. in other words: we did not transgress the law when we implemented dap. the constitution and the administrative code are not at odds with each other,” he said. [PNA]
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014 11EDGEDAVAO
HEALTH
“THe sole truly uni-versal food for the entire human
species.” That was how Dr. Hiroshi Nakajima, former director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), described breast milk.
The WHO, along with two other united Nations agencies – the International Labor Organization (ILO) and uN Children’s Fund (uNICeF) – said that the breast-feeding rate among mothers in the Philippines has significantly increased.
The three uN agen-cies cited recent figures released by the Food and Nutrition Research Insti-tute showing breast-feed-ing rates to have increased from 36 percent in 2008 to 47 percent in 2011. In addition, the initiation of breast-feeding within one hour of delivery also rose to 52 percent in 2011 from 32 percent in 2008.
Some years back, the national breast-feeding rate was only 16 percent. experts believe the low rate was due to advertise-ment made by the formula milk industry. It reported-ly spent billions of pesos to promote its products through ads in televisions, radios, and newspapers.
“Advertising is the main way that big corporations convince mothers who can breast feed that the bottle is best,” writes Father Shay Cullen, of Preda Center, in his column. “It became so
effective that breast-feed-ing dropped and mortality rates for children one to two years old vastly increased.”
A global study showed the Philippines – with 82,000 annual deaths – as one of the countries ac-counting for 90 percent of deaths among those under five years old. The study also disclosed that only 16 percent of 4- to 5-month-old babies were breastfed exclusively while 30 per-cent were formula fed.
Most formula milk ads contain “false medical claims,” to quote the words of Dr. Nicholas Alipui, then uNICeF country represen-tative. emphasizing “the vast difference” between breast milk and baby for-mula, he explained that milk from mothers had superior quality and con-tained nutrients and an-tibodies that would help raise children with strong immune systems.
“Breast milk is a living substance that is impossi-ble to duplicate or replicate in industry.... No technolo-gy is capable of replicating or duplicating mother’s milk. That’s a fact. Any claim to the contrary is a lie,” Dr. Alipui pointed out.
By breast-feeding her baby, a mother can save money. Filipino mothers spend 21.5 billion pesos a year on infant formula. That’s about 2000 pesos a month per child, according to uNICeF.
As the best source of
nutrition for babies, breast milk has been proven many times over that breast milk has components that help protect the child against infection and disease. Dr. Nakajima said breast milk, until recently, has served as “a vital link for nutri-tion and survival across the entire span of human existence, nurturing the newborn, the infant, and the young child during the most vulnerable years, all the while providing a pow-erful source of protection from infectious disease.”
Breast milk, the united Nations health agency ex-plains, is more than a sim-ple collection of nutrients. It contains all the essential nutrients like protein, fats, vitamins, minerals, en-zymes, and sugars, in exact proportion. It meets the needs of the growing infant at every stage.
For thousands of years, in all continents, babies have been breastfed for simple reason: mother’s milk is natural. “It comes ready-prepared, pure, warm, does not require mixing or sterilization and above all it is free. It is a living substance,” says one physician.
“Mother’s milk is a liv-ing substance of great bio-logical complexity that not only provides unique pro-tection against disease, but also stimulates the baby’s own immune system,” the WHO points out.
The WHO recom-
mends exclusive breast-feeding for the first six months of life, after which “infants should receive nu-tritionally adequate and safe complementary foods while breastfeeding con-tinues for up to two years of age or beyond.”
The American Acad-emy of Pediatrics point-ed out the importance of breastfeeding. It said: “extensive research using improved epidemiologic methods and modern lab-oratory techniques docu-ments diverse and compel-ling advantages for infants, mothers, families, and so-ciety from breastfeeding and use of human milk for infant feeding. These ad-vantages include health, nutritional, immunologic, developmental, psycholog-ic, social, economic, and en-vironmental benefits.”
Breast milk is easi-ly digested by babies, so they don’t have to face the problem of constipation. Breastfed babies rarely have ear or respiratory sys-tem infections, allergies, stomach problems like di-arrhea and vomiting.
Children who were breastfed exclusively for at least three months had bet-ter intelligence scores later in life than those who re-ceived formula, according to a study in the Archives of General Psychiatry.
Children who are arti-ficially fed or breastfed for only 6 months or less, are at an increased risk of de-
veloping cancer before age 15, according to Dr. M.K. Davis in an article which appeared in Lancet. The risk of artificially fed chil-dren was 1-8 times that of long-term breastfed chil-dren, and the risk for short term feeders was 1-9 times that of long term breast feeders.
In an article, “Mother’s Milk: An Ounce of Preven-tion,” which appeared in Arthritis Today, the relation between juvenile rheu-matoid arthritis (JRA) and breast milk was discussed. Preliminary data from re-searchers at the university of North Carolina and Duke university comparing 54 children with JRA and a control group without JRA of similar age and race in-dicates that children who were breastfed were only 40% as likely to develop JRA.
What are some of the benefits a mother gets from breastfeeding? For one, it delays fertility. A study, which appeared in Journal of Biosco Sci, found out that women who nurse frequently during exclusive breastfeeding remained amenorrhoeic longer than infrequent nursers, intro-duced supplements later and did not resume men-ses as promptly thereaf-ter. Amennorhea is the absence of a menstrual pe-riod in a woman of repro-ductive age.
Breastfeeding protects women from having uter-
ine cancer, according to a study which appeared in Medical Journal of Aus-tralia. “A protective effect against uterine cancer was found for women who breastfeed,” said Dr. K.e. Brocke.
There are several good reasons why mothers are breast-feeding their ba-bies again. One reason is because of the Milk Code, or executive Order No. 51, which ensures that breast-feeding is protected and women are given clear information on the bene-fits of breast-feeding with-out the undue influence of infant formula companies. The Milk Code was signed by President Corazon Aquino in 1986.
Then there’s the Breastfeeding Act of 1992 and the expanded Breast-feeding Promotion Act of 2009. Through these laws, the government has intensified its campaign for exclusive breastfeeding among lactating mothers to raise healthy children.
When asked why he recommends breastfeed-ing, a doctor replies, “It is one of the wonders of the nature that breast-milk contains all the essen-tial nutrients like protein, fats, vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and sugars, in exact proportion. It meets the needs of the growing infant at every stage. This is one of the important ad-vantages of breastfeeding over formula.”
Best milk for babiesContributor
By gERRy T. ESTRERA
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 201412CLASSIFIED
Billiard Supplies
( )
Phone Nos. Cell Nos.
INdulge! VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
EDGEDAVAOFOOD
The images that are conjured up by 4th of July celebrations usually involve fireworks lighting up the evening sky as well as tail-gate parties from coast to coast. Since pyro-technics are illegal in Davao, Seda Abreeza thought of a better way of celebrating the stars and stripes by throwing a wonderful 4th of July celebration cocktails and chow at the hotel’s restaurant, Misto.
The evening was a relaxed, wine and dine affair with an endless supply of special 4th of July cocktails, SKYY Vodka and various wines to pair with the sumptuous spread of all-American dishes which included Roast Beef, Baby Back Ribs, Sloppy Joe Sandwiches as well as Chili Dogs. There were also a pair of giant burgers that were as big as an eight-inch diameter cake. I loved the rich and fatty Roast Beef as well as the smokey good-ness of the Baby Back Ribs. Kudos to Seda’s Chef Bang who is slated to participate at the upcoming Davao Food Festival at Ma-nila’s Intercontinental hotel. “This event is an opportunity for Seda to encourage Dabawe-nyos to enjoy night outs with delicious food paired with lim-itless wines and spir-its.” says Seda general manager Kennedy
Kapulong. Misto also had a live jazz duo to complete the Misto 4th of July dining ex-perience. Although Duri-anburg’s celebrations may be less noisy and less boisterous, it does not mean that eve-nings and events are boring, and with Seda and Misto, you can be sure there are more happenings that will redefine Davao eve-ning urbanscape. Follow me on Ins-tagram or on Twitter @kennethkingong for more travel tips, foodie finds, and happenings in, around, and be-yond Durianburg.
An all-American 4th of July evening at Seda
Choosing from the many different wines at Misto’s bar.
Misto’s Baby Back Ribs
Roast Beef Short Plate.
Sloppy Joes and Chili Dogs.
Seda Abreeza’s GM Kennedy Kapulong together with the Misto team.
Stars and stripes inspired desserts.With Seda’s General Manager Kennedy Kapulong.
A cosmopolitan using SKYY Vodka.
GCash, the flagship mobile money service of G-Xchange, Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Globe Telecom, is boost-ing operations of local government units (LGUs) by paving the way for fast and secure payment services using the mo-bile phone. GCash teamed up with the local governments of Que-zon City, Valenzuela City and Batangas City under UsaID’s scaling Innovation through Mobile Money (sIMM) project to provide residents a platform to settle their payments of real property tax and business and construction permits. “We are happy to help the government fulfill its duties to its residents by making GCash accessible to them. Us-ing our mobile payment system, residents of Quezon City, Valenzuela City and Batangas City will no longer have to travel all the way to city hall and queue in line for hours to pay for their real property taxes as well as for their busi-ness and construction permits. With GCash, residents get a better, faster and more convenient option to settle their financial obligations. all they need to do is to simply regis-ter to GCash and pay using their mobile phones,” says G-Xchange, Inc. President Paolo Baltao. GCash provides the most innovative mobile money sys-tem that drives real-time assessment and easy payment anytime, anywhere. Quezon City residents can use GCash to pay for real property taxes, while those in Batangas City can pay their for business permits using the innovative mo-bile money service. Meanwhile, residents in Valenzuela City can settle their real property taxes and business and con-struction permit payments using GCash. They may register to GCash by dialing *143# for FREE, select GCash, Register, and provide the necessary information. Payment of Real Property Tax can be made by dialing *137# using Globe/TM sIM; select Quezon City/Valenzuela City; Choose Real Property Tax; Input the Tax Declaration Number; Confirm Tax Declaration Number for assessment; Choose which balance to pay (1) Current Quarter Balance and (2) Year-end Balance and Confirm payment details. Meanwhile, Batangas City and Valenzuela City residents can pay for their business permits by simply dialing *137# using Globe/TM sIM; select Batangas City/Valenzuela City; Choose Business Permit; Input the account Number and proceed with the payment. a GCash wallet may be funded through GCash outlets nationwide (available in Globe stores, Puregold super-markets, Partner Rural Banks, Globe Load Distributors, and partner pawnshops like Villarica and Tambunting Pawn-shops among others); Mobile banking through BPI Mobile Bank and Unionbank; GCash online via Megalink online cash-in and aTM via Bancnet. For more information on GCash products and services, visit www.globe.com.ph/gcash.
GCash powers LGUs with fast and secure payment services
A2 INdulge! VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014EDGEDAVAOUP aND aBOUT TRaVEL
“When God created the world, he was very gener-ous with the Philippines – giving the country no less than 7,107 islands with pristine beaches, majestic mountains, rich forest, flora and fauna and para-dise of natural and cultur-al wonders.” If there was a secret para-dise in the Philippines, it must be the Agusan Marsh Wildlife Sanctu-ary in Sitio Panlabuhan, Municipality of Loreto, Agusan del Sur, Island Mindanao. That’s because visiting it is no walk in the park or at the street since it re-quires several hours of land and riverboat travel to get to the marsh itself. Set-up the pump boat ride would also require some effort and a lot of funds too if you don’t have the right connections. But no reservation, the Agusan Marsh is paradise to Visit and Discover, Depths and explore.
....... Agusan Marsh is ancestral domain of the Manobos.The Agusan Marsh is home of mostly ethnic Manobo’s indigenous peoples (IPs) who live in harmony with nature as far back as memory can recall. The community in Lake Panlabuhan exhibits this elaborate relationship with nature. They know the INS and OUTS of their place; the histories and relationship with the abundant life in there they continuously nurture; the spirits and ancestors they continue to hold in the highest regard. ….... They Live in Float-ing Houses.Their houses are floating
wooden structures, which are quite sturdy, are built on hundreds of pieces of bamboo with thatched roofs and rest on a plat-form lashed to enormous logs together with the level of the marsh. Whole communities exist like this, their houses teth-ered to one another in one place, but moveable at any time and depending on the current.Take note also that there’s electricity in some of the dwelling in the village through the used of Solar Panel whom donated by NGO’s more than three years ago. Seldom they used also power genera-tor for some important occasion that the Local Government of Loreto provided them. There is also a floating
pre-school building in the community as well as the floating house of wor-ship, the Chapel. So you really feel at one with na-ture while you are there. Amusingly, though the mobile phone signal was very strong in the marsh area, Globe connection. ….... The IP’s Residence Offered RitualAs part of mandatory tradition, we had to meet the community elders for a Manobo ritual to pay respect to the spirits, ask permission for my pres-ence and request for safe passage while I was there. I was told that some visi-tors who simply entered the ancestral area without doing the ritual met a di-saster of some sort, pre-dictable.
The ritual began with the elder conversing with the spirits, mentioning that where (guests) was in the community. On the table was lighted candle, the eggs on a plate, a bottle of beer plus a glass with a serving of beer, a lighted cigarettes and a piso coins coming from the group (each of us). After the conversation, the village elder stood up, took the glass of beer, pro-ceeded to the window and emptied its contents into the marsh, coins was also throw-in. Then the glass was filled-up again and again and passed around so that everyone in the room was able to drink as respect to whom they given ritual.After the ritual, we had a
Agusan Marsh Wildlife Sanctuary:My Weekend Stopover, My Home
‘a place wished-for by nature, and park-ranger of IP’s called Manobos’
Text and Photos by: Edwin B. Lasquite, MM
agusan Marsh is ancestral domain of the Manobos. The agusan Marsh is home of mostly ethnic Manobo’s indigenous peoples (IPs) who live in harmony with nature as far back as memory can recall. The community in Lake Panlabuhan exhibits this elabo-rate relationship with nature. They know the INs and OUTs of their place; the histories and relationship with the abundant life in there they continuously nurture; the spirits and ancestors they continue to hold in the highest regard.
Community Experience - The next morning, I was up ear-ly since the community wanted to show us the sunrise, the floating thousands of hyacinths, go boating on the lake and aside from joining the locals go fishing around the marsh, bird watching is also another activity of which agusan Marsh being host to over 200 species of birds. The numbers swell especially during the cold months when the marsh hosts communities of migratory birds.
My Weekend adventure Trip - My trip to agusan Marsh starts with land travel from (Davao del Norte Province in Tagum City Overland Terminal (4:20am), passing through Compostela Valley Province to crossing in Barangay Cue-vas in Municipality of Trento (7:30am). That would take several hours depending on where you are coming from. From crossing Cuevas, a ride travel passing 2 Municipali-ties (sta. Josefa and Vereula) and 1 Barangay (Neuva Gra-cia) to Poblacion of the Municipality of Loreto that would takes around 1 hour and 30 minutes.
Floyd Patricio, Esme Escoto and Gab saplagio of Team Tuklas were named the big winners of the Cebu Pacific Juan for Fun Backpacker Challenge Year 3. The UP Diliman Physics majors clinched the top scores in a series of thrilling tasks and adventurous dares, besting four other university teams from across the Philippines.
This year, for the first time ever, Cebu Pacific brought the Juan for Fun teams to an international adventure, as the challenged kicked off in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The nine-day, six-city adventure continued in Bacolod, Cebu, Camiguin and, Cagayan de Oro, and culminated in Manila.
During the course of the challenge, the teams were tasked to accomplish the most number of fun and excit-ing activities in each destination, maximizing their travel allowance of 800 Malaysian Ringgit and PhP35,000. To fully experience the fun of budget travel, they were given the freedom to plan their activities. special fun challenges prepared by the Department of Tourism and Tourism Malaysia also gave teams the chance to earn ex-tra points and additional prizes.
Making this year’s challenge even more remark-able were the adventure Coaches, noted personalities known for their love for travelling, who were assigned to mentor each team before they headed to their des-tination. During the course of the challenge, sportsman and TV host Paolo abrera, champion surfer Luke Land-rigan, Internet funnyman Bogart the Explorer, renowned travel writer Jude Bacalso, and volleyball star Gretchen ho offered tips and cheered for their respective teams through social media.
UP Physics majors bag first-place win in Cebu Pacific Juan for Fun challenge
FAGUSAN, A2
INdulge! A3VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014EDGEDAVAO
short caucus meeting with the locals in the commu-nity, an open discussion. ….. Conversation with the LocalsAccording to those I talk-ed with, the water rises during the rainy season to create large lakes. It is during this time that vast numbers of ducks come to Agusan Marsh to nest and in the Lake, you get to see several square kilome-ters of lily pads, hyacinths and other aquatic plants spread out like an enor-mous green quilt. The dark tea-colored waters are home to untold num-bers of catfish, carp, soft-shell fresh water turtles called “dinata,” and sail-fin lizard.This wetland immerses up excess water from a yearly rainfall of four meters plus nine rivers that slice through the provinces of Agusan del Sur, Agusan del Norte and Compostela Valley Province.The former President Fi-del V. Ramos declared the marshland, which covers an area of 14,835.989 hect-ares, as a protected area.….... Community Expe-rienceThe next morning, I was up early since the com-munity wanted to show us the sunrise, the floating thousands of hyacinths, go boating on the lake and aside from joining the lo-cals go fishing around the marsh, bird watching is also another activity of which Agusan Marsh be-ing host to over 200 spe-cies of birds. The numbers swell especially during the cold months when the marsh hosts communities of migratory birds.We experienced that knowledge on our own, in an off the record yet in-sightful way of exchange with the Manobo com-munity during our stayed for two days. I, Madayaw and the group led by Min-danao Tourism Council Member Jonallier, the Travel Teller himself Olan and rest of my Beyaheng-Mindanaw Family Carol,
Sarah, Louie, Nicole, Leah, Jayvie, Jea, Fra, Kit, Dan and Jovic and Jeniel of the Wild Birds Photog-raphers of the Philippines, vigilantly listened to the communities’ knowledge of conservation, their proud rapport with na-ture including their way of answering to the flood by hiding their whole community into the for-est, or their life of living with the crocodiles.
….... My Weekend Ad-venture TripMy trip to Agusan Marsh starts with land travel from (Davao del Norte Province in Tagum City Overland Termi-nal (4:20am), passing through Compostela Val-ley Province to crossing in Barangay Cuevas in Municipality of Trento (7:30am). That would take several hours depending on where you are coming from. From crossing Cue-vas, a ride travel passing 2 Municipalities (Sta. Josefa and Vereula) and 1 Baran-gay (Neuva Gracia) to Po-blacion of the Municipal-ity of Loreto that would takes around 1 hour and 30 minutes. The jump-off point for the riverboat ride in pan-talan at Purok 7A in po-blacion Loreto (1:20pm) cruising onwards to Umayam River, Sabang Kawayanan to crossing point in Barangay Kati-punan that would take again an hour (2:20am).Due to the lowest level of water “low tide” going to Sitio Panlabuhan, we had to change small pump-boats when we neared the entrance of the marsh (crossing Katipunan) passing through Dagun Creek, Lake Bukogon, Lake Kanimbaylan to Si-tio Panlabuhan (3:10pm), a pump-boats have a hard time entering those Lakes due to the high concen-tration of lilies, hyacinths and other water plants.“Agusan Marsh is every-body’s landscape pho-tographer’s dream.,” Ma-dayaw!!!
….... Come, Enjoy, Commune, with Nature!“You don’t have to go far to get the once in a life time experience, enough to create lasting memo-ries. Invite your friends and love ones along and visit one of nature’s jew-els, beautifully crafted to inspire everyone. Come and indulge yourself in a journey of pleasure that doesn’t cost the earth,” saying from Adolph ed-ward G. Plaza, the Pro-vincial Governor of Agu-san del SurSpecial Thanks to: Provincial Governor of Agusan del Sur – Gov-ernor Adolph edward G.
PlazaMunicipal Mayor of Lo-reto - Mayor Dario Otaza and his wife Madame LigayaProvincial Supervising Tourism Operations Of-ficer – Mr. Nathaniel G. LamzonMunicipal Tourism Offi-cer of Loreto – Mr. Matt PoriaMunicipal Information Officer of Loreta , Des-ignate – Mr. Juvanie es-pariaFOR The WARM WeLCOMe ACCOM-MODATION & GIV-ING US INSIGhTS AND INFORMATION, ThANKS & ShOKRAN!
The floating house of worship, the Chapel.
Conversation with the Locals. according to those I talked with, the water rises during the rainy season to create large lakes. It is during this time that vast numbers of ducks come to agusan Marsh to nest and in the Lake, you get to see several square kilometers of lily pads, hya-cinths and other aquatic plants spread out like an enor-mous green quilt.
The floating pre-school building in the community.
The Manilay Ancestral house, was built decades ago out, made out of authentic ma-terials from the ruins of the old houses in Laguna and Batangas, was brought to exis-tence here in Gensan. Piece by piece it was reconstructed, neat huh?
Exploring the Manilay Ancestral House
The house if filled with old artifacts and the an-tique collections of Mr. and Mrs. Warren A. Ma-nilay, from wood carv-ings, religious artifacts, furniture, jewellery and vintage appliances and cars, that were all ac-quired from the Manilays various trips around the Philippines. The ancestral house became their mu-seum, that they opened to the public so they could get a glimpse of the past and have that certain feel-ing of how life was back then. I was lucky to have been invited for a pho-toshoot with edwin G.
espejo, Cocoy Sexcion and Ronald Velasquez, I was able to get an even closer look at this majes-tic house. As soon as you step in the house, you’d find yourself oozing with “Ohh!!!”’s and “Wooows”. My eyes were out of con-
trol, not knowing what to look at first. But a few stuff definitely caught my eye, a vintage fire extinguisher, a fully functional non-electrical wooden fridge, a hair brush a handheld mirror made of silver, and a half empty Chanel No. 5 bottle, I screeched like a fangirl out of sheer amazement, I wanted to take a whiff off the bottle, wondered how it’ll smell like, just out of curiosity. Whenever you’re in Gensan, you definitely have to put this in your list. The Manilay Ances-tral house is located at Purok Malakas, Barangay San Isidro, right behind Savemore. Follow me on Twitter or Instagram, @kyriekoutre for more adventures in and around my wonder-land that is Gensan, Tuna Capital of the Philippines.
The living room is full of antiques and other bric-a-brac.
Another room was filled with vintage scooters and motorcycles.
An antique fire extinguisher.
A pair of old brass lamps.
The owners also collected classic cars.
This vintage bottle of Chanel No.5 made me screech like a fan girl.
Call: 224-0733 • Tionko St., Davao City
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014 13
Account Executives (3)- Male / Female, not more than 30 years old- Candidate must posses a Bachelor/ College Degree in any Business field.- Willing to work under pressure, flexible, persuasive, can speak fluently and computer literate- A team player- With Basic Salary, Transportation, Communication, allowance + Commission
For interested applicants, you may send your resume to:
CLASSIFIED
General Santos Drive, Koronadal City, South Cotabato 9506Tel. No. 083-228-2511 ; Fax No. 083-228-2654
WANTED FOR IMMEDIATE HIRING!
BUS DRIVER
Qualifications:
1. Male, 28 – 40 years old2. At least high school graduate3. With 5 years driving experience (bus, trucks)
Requirements:
1. Driver’s License with Official Receipt2. 2 x 2 I.D. picture (2 pcs.)3. Certificate of Employment or clearance from previous employment
May apply in person at Human Resource Department, YBLI Office, General Santos Drive, Koronadal City.
General Santos Drive, Koronadal City, South Cotabato 9506
Tel. No. 083-228-2511 ; Fax No. 083-228-2654
WANTeD FOR IMMeDIATe HIRING!
BuS DRIVeR
Qualifications:
1. Male, 28 – 40 years old2. At least high school graduate3. With 5 years driving experience (bus, trucks)
Requirements:1. Driver’s License with Official Receipt2. 2 x 2 I.D. picture (2 pcs.)3. Certificate of employment or clearance from
May apply in person at Human Resource Department, YBLI Office, General Santos Drive, Koronadal City.
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
RIO De JANeIRO (AP) — Mario Goetze pro-duced the piece of
individual skill that Lionel Messi couldn’t muster.
With two quick, deft touches, Goetze ended Ger-many’s 24-year wait for another World Cup title — and denied Messi the one title he needs to forever take his place among the game’s all-time greats.
Goetze scored the win-ning goal in extra time to give Germany a 1-0 victory over Argentina on Sunday in a tight and tense World Cup final that was decid-ed by one moment of bril-liance.
Goetze, who wasn’t born when West Germany beat Argentina in the 1990 final, controlled a cross with his chest in the 113th minute and in one fluid mo-tion volleyed the ball past goalkeeper Sergio Romero and inside the far post from five yards out.
It was a goal that gave Germany its fourth World Cup title, equal second with Italy on the list of all-time champions and just behind Brazil’s five.
“It’s an unbelievable feeling. I don’t know how to describe it. You just shoot that goal in, you don’t really know what’s happening,” Goetze said. “And then at the end of the match, hav-ing a party with the team, the whole country ... it is for us, a dream come true.”
At the final whistle, Ger-
14 SPORTS
MOMENT OF
LAS VeGAS - Filipi-no American Jordan Clarkson made 6 of 14
shots for 16 points as the Los Angeles Lakers faced the New Orleans Pelicans in the ongoing 2014 NBA Summer League Sunday afternoon at the Thomas and Mack Cen-ter.
Despite Clarkson’s best efforts, though, the Lakers dropped a 90-73 decision. The Lakers are now 0-2 in Summer League play.
Courtney Fells led the Pelicans with 25 points while DeQuan Jones added 14 and 4 boards. Jeff Whitey added 11 and Patric Young finished with 10 for New Orleans, which made 36 of 65 field goals (55.4 percent) and 8-of-15 triples (53.3 percent)
Los Angeles, meanwhile,
shot just 27 of 62 from the field (43.5 percent) and 10 of 24 from 3-point range (41.7 percent).
Trey Thompkins paced the Lakers with 18 points and Kendall Marshall ac-counted for 11. Julius Randle chipped in 10.
CAVS 80, SPURS 72 In other action, the
Cleveland Cavaliers tripped the San Antonio Spurs, 80-72. The Cavs improved to 2-0 in the tournament while the Spurs fell to 1-1.
Jack Cooley had 15 for the Cavs while Anthony Bennett, last year’s top draft pick, registered 13 and 14 rebounds. Andrew Wiggins, this year’s No.2 drat pick,
DeShaun Thomas top-scored for the Spurs with 21 while Jarmychal Green pitched in 12.
WINNING GOAL. Germany’s Mario Goetze celebrates after scoring the opening goal during the World Cup final soccer match between Germany and Argentina at the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Monday (PHL Time).
SELFIE. German players take a selfie after winning the World Cup finals over Argentina.
Late goal by gutsy Goetze
Lakers’ Fil-Am rookie making good impression
many players fell into a pile in the middle of the pitch in celebration. Messi walked past them with his hands on his hips — still in the shadow of his compatriot Diego Maradona, who led
his country to the 1986 title.Goetze went on as a sub-
stitute for Miroslav Klose toward the end of regula-tion time and his fresh legs made the difference.
Andre Schuerrle broke
down the left flank, send-ing his cross into the area, and the Bayern Munich midfielder did the rest with a clinical finish. The goal echoed that of Andres Ini-esta four years ago, when
the midfielder scored in similar fashion but from the other side of the area to give Spain a 1-0 extra-time win over the Netherlands.
According to Germa-ny coach Joachim Loew, it
was exactly as he’d planned when he made the substitu-tion.
“I said to Mario Goetze, ‘OK, show to the world that you’re better than Mes-si and you can decide the
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014 15SPORTS
BRILLIANCE
ARGeNTINA captain Li-onel Messi ended the World Cup final with
a golden trophy in his hands, but it was not the one he wanted.
Moments after the final whistle at the Maracana sta-dium and with Germany’s ju-bilant players still cavorting
on the pitch, Messi was called up to receive the Golden Ball award for the tournament’s best player.
He flashed a perfuncto-ry smile, but it was with the knowledge that Argentina’s defeat had prevented him from cementing his place in the pantheon of the truly great.
“The truth is it doesn’t in-terest me at this moment,” he
admitted later.While the 27-year-old
has won everything there is to win -- and broken every record o break -- with Barce-lona, the World Cup final of-fered him the opportunity to definitively seal his legacy in the sport.
Pele, Zinedine Zidane and Ronaldo all scored decisive goals in World Cup finals, while Diego Maradona cre-
ated the goal that settled the 1986 tournament. But Messi found himself upstaged by Mario Goetze’s sensational extra-time winner for Ger-many.
He will be haunted in particular by a glaring op-portunity early in the second half, when with only Germa-ny goalkeeper Manuel Neuer to beat, he whipped his shot wide.
It was to be his only clear sight of goal, and his failure to seize the chance continued a narrative that had taken root earlier in the knockout phase.
Whereas Maradona seemed to grow with each match as Argentina surged to the title in 1986, scoring braces against england and Belgium in the quarter-finals and semi-finals, Messi ap-peared to shrink.
ALMATY, KAZAKH-STAN-- PLDT-ABAP national boxers Rey
Saludar and Charly Suarez seemed to have done ev-erything right but could not convince the judges in the Fi-nals of the Kazakhstan Presi-dent’s Cup here.
Both settled for silver medals.
Suarez knocked down Asian lightweight champi-on Berik Abdrahmanov in the third round with a wick-ed right hook that landed flush on the Kazkh’s kisser. Abdrahmanov went down in a heap and was given an 8-count by the referee, got up at the count of four, still wobbly.
He tried to engage game-ly, but instead got tagged re-
peatedly by Suarez’s bombs until the bell surprisingly ended the torment.
“That bell rang suspi-ciously early,” rued coach el-mer Pamisa. “We never even heard the 10-second clapper to signify that the round was about to end.”
What was even more shocking was that the deci-sion was unanimous for the Kazakh with judges from Russia and ukraine scoring it 29-28 and a judge from the Kazakh region of Shymkent submitting a tally sheet of 30-27, all for Abdrahmanov.
Saludar also looked like he had outpunched his uz-bek opponent Zoirov but likewise suffered a unani-mous decision defeat, 30-26, 30-27 & 30-27.
After a long 23-hour trip which started in Davao City Satur-
day afternoon, IBO World Super flyweight Champion edrin “The Sting” Dapud-ong and the three other members of his delegation arrived in very cold Johan-nesburg, South Africa at 6 a.m. today, Sunday, July 13.
As the team got out of the Tambo Airport in Jo-hannesburg to proceed to a small bed and breakfast inn near the airport where they will rest for two days before proceeding to east London, Dapudong im-mediately felt the biting cold which even at 11 a.m. today was at 63 degrees
Fahrenheit or 17 degrees Celsius.
The mercury is expect-ed to further dip later this afternoon prompting chief trainer Raides “Nonoy” Neri to hold Dapudong’s light workout at about 2 p.m. today.
While Dapudong rest-ed shortly after arriving at the Airport Bed and Break-fast Inn just beside the Tambo Airport, the other members of the team, in-cluding assistant train-er Rex Penalosa and this writer, proceeded to a mall nearby to buy an addition-al room heater and other things that the champion needed in preparation for
the fight. Dapudong said he was
hardly affected by the long trip, having gone through two previous trips which passed through Dubai which was about 6 hours longer than the Davao-Sin-gapore-Johannesburg route.
He was also buoyed by encouraging words from fellow Filipinos who recognized him during the trip, including a town-mate from M’lang, North Cotabato, Noel Limas Cu-erpo, who traveled with the Dapudong team from Davao City to Singapore en route to his home base now in Australia.
After the long trip and a half day rest, Dapudong tipped the scale at 121 lbs., which is 6 pounds over the weight limit with six days before the world title de-fense against South Afri-ca’s Lwandile Sityatha.
“Weight is not a con-cern,” said trainer Nonoy Neri, who is also the as-sistant trainer for Filipino boxing icon Manny Pac-quiao.
On Wednesday, the team is expected to fly down to east London which is about one and a half hours by plane from Johannesburg for the pre-medical and a media conference.
THE AGONY OF DEFEAT. Argentina’s Pablo Zabaleta lies on the pitch as Lionel Messi stands beside him after the World Cup final soccer match between Germany and Argentina at the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Mario Goetze volleyed in the winning goal in extra time to give Germany its fourth World Cup title with a 1-0 victory over Argentina. (AP Photo/Francois Xavier Marit, Pool).
Messi squanders chance to join greats
Saludar, Suarez settle for silver in Kazakhstan Team Dapudong arrives in ‘very cold’ South Africa
PhilBoxing.com
By MANNy PIñOl
World Cup. You have all the possibilities to do that,’” Loew said. “I had a good feeling with him.”
Germany became the first european team to win a World Cup in the Ameri-cas, and the victory ends a string of near misses since winning its last major ti-tle at the 1996 european Championship. The team lost the 2002 World Cup fi-nal to Brazil, the euro 2008 final to Spain and was elim-inated in the semifinals in both 2006 and 2010.
Argentina had not been back in the final since that 1990 loss, and has now been beaten by Germany in the last three World Cups.
“This was our chance, and we felt that way. We couldn’t do it. We have to lift our heads and suffer the pain,” Argentina midfield-er Javier Mascherano said. “Obviously, the pain is tre-mendous.”
It is Germany’s first World Cup title as a unified nation, having won as West Germany in 1954, 1974 and 1990.
The Germans faced Ar-gentina in both the 1986 and 1990 finals, during Ma-radona’s heyday. This time, they were up against Messi, the four-time world player of the year who has set a slew of scoring records in leading Barcelona to ev-ery major club title and is widely considered the best player since Maradona.
gives Germany the World Cup
VOL. 7 ISSUE 86 • TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
ON TOP OF THE WORLD
16 EDGEDAVAOSports
CITY Hall executives leaned on the big third period run
spearheaded by its go-to-guy Christopher “Bong” Go to trounce IBP Davao Ori-ental, 96 - 87, and clinch their first win in the 2014 Integrated Bar of the Phil-ippines (IBP) Basketball Tournament on Saturday at the Hall of Justice Cov-ered Court in ecoland.
Go racked up 15 of his 49 points in the third stanza, including a pivotal corner trey to open the pe-riod that ignited the game changing rally.
The executives gained momentum from the three pointer of Go that got its offensive and defensive game going and went on to force turnovers that led to points.
The City Hall-based dribblers broke loose, pill-ing up a 74 - 63 lead enter-ing the pay off period after a tight first half contest that came to a close with the IBP DavOr leading by 1, 48 - 47.
Michael Peloton and eugene Labor chipped in 10 baskets apiece for the executives who joined IBP
Davao and Team Judiciary on the winning board on Saturday.
IBP DavOr showed more energy and superb firepower in the first half behind Armand Dioso who laudably made his first seven shots all the way to a 23 first two period points.
But their offense sud-denly stagnated in the sec-ond half as the executives stepped up their defense, limiting Dioso to just six baskets.
Dioso totaled for 29 points while Santiago had 18 for the IBP DavOr which
was also caught flat-footed on the defense side in the final half.
Timely shots by Pelo-ton and a three pointer by city sports consultant Glenn Escandor in the final frame helped deliver the final blow for the Execu-tives.
IBP DavOr held an eight-point lead midway of the second period before the executives behind Go mounted a huge fightback to cut the deficit to one at the break.
IBP Davao turned back IBP Davao del Norte while
T e a m Judicia-ry defeated BJMP, 105 - 99. (Rico Bil-iran)
IBP DAVOR - 87 - Dioso 29, Santiago 18, Dayanghi-rang 9, Caharian 8, Ladeza 8, Quico 4, Pudpud 4, De Vera 2, Cosquejo 2, Apos-tol 2
DOUBLE TROUBLE
RIO De JANeIRO (AP) — united they stand, right
at the top of the foot-ball world.
And right on South American soil.
Germany won its fourth World Cup title on Sunday,
but its first since a country torn apart by
political divisions at the end of World War II was finally glued back to-gether.
"It was always my dream to get on the summit and look down," said Miroslav Klose, a Polish-born Germany striker who is a perfect example of the country's unifica-tion and its diversity. "Incredible."
The Germany victory at the iconic Maracana Stadi-um was special for another reason, too. The Germans became the first European team to win a World Cup in the Americas, coming after they humiliated host Brazil 7-1 in the semifinals and then got the best of Argen-tina and Lionel Messi 1-0 in the final.
Along the way, Klose set the record for World Cup goals, scoring his 16th in the rout over Brazil to push himself ahead of Brazil striker Ronaldo.
Klose didn't score on Sunday at the Maracana, however. Instead, it was the man who replaced him in the 88th minute, Mario Goetze, that did.
Goetze's moment of brilliance, chesting the
ball to control it and then volleying past Argentina goalkeeper Sergio Rome-ro deep in extra time, was just another sample of the teamwork that has lifted this tightly knit Germany setup to the top.
"The team did it beau-tifully," said Manuel Neuer, voted the best goalkeep-er of the tournament. "At some point we'll stop cele-brating, but we'll still wake up with a smile."
After winning the World Cup title in 1954, West Germany turned it-self into a powerhouse on the field. The west side of the divided nation later won the 1972 european Championship and then the 1974 World Cup, play-ing as the host.
Another european title
came in 1980, followed a loss to Italy in the 1982 World Cup final. The West Germans again reached the final in 1986, but lost to an Argentina team led by Diego Maradona in Mexico. They got their revenge four years later, beating the Argentines in 1990 to win the World Cup for a third time.
Their lone major title as a united country came at euro 96, when they beat the Czech Republic in the final at another of football's grandest venues, Wembley Stadium. But they have come very close many times since, losing to Brazil in the 2002 final and reaching the semifinals in both 2006 and 2010.
DEADLY DUO. City Hall Executives backcourt tandem of Glenn Escandpr (left) and Bong Go (right).
Execs trounce IBP DavOr 96-87
GUTSY PLAY. Germany’s Mario Goetze scores the winning goal during the World Cup final soccer match between Germany and Argentina at the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Monday (PHL Time).
