Friday, November 23, 2007 Roperos: Two good programs By Godofredo M. Roperos Politics Also
TWO things called my attention to the social condition in the countryside. Both appear to me to be matters basic to the heart of rural folks.
One of these is the Department of Agriculture’s (DA) plan to open Barangay Food Terminals in various areas of the region so farmers can earn more from the sale of their vegetables, fruits, and root crops. DA 7 technicians claim food traders are taking advantage of the farmers.
The other is the Cebu Provincial Police Office (CPPO) organizing the Barangay Intelligence Network (BIN). I hope the police looks at the information gathering network as a feedback mechanism for the government, not just as an espionage operation for the police or the military.
In fact, the BIN would be more valuable to the administration as a means of funneling to the President public reactions to her policy decisions.
In a way, the programs of DA 7 and the CPPO should be complimentary with each other, as they share the objective of improving the quality of life of our rural folks.
BIN members, if taught the skills of gathering vital information at the grassroots, and feeding them upwards would enable the national leadership to make the right decisions. Knowing the actual and true condition from the grassroots upwards makes governance half-won.
At the same time, when rural inhabitants are able to earn a living that endows them a certain comfort, it would be easy to maintain peace and order in the countryside.
Such a condition of peace and stability should mean that the country’s satisfactory economic well-being has finally seeped down to the villages.
Indeed, the vehicle that could well carry satisfactory economic well-being to the countryside is the DA 7-envisioned Barangay Food Terminal. When it shall have become operational, it would extend to our haplessly exploited farm folks a new lease on life, with their hard work evenly rewarded.
It is a fact that our farmers are always short-changed by lowland traders of farm products. They buy cheap, and sell in town and city markets at ten times higher than the buying price.
Truly, the food terminals and the BIN could jointly extend a better life to our people in the rural areas, the life that our politicians have long promised them but never really quite made good.
