BAGUIO City Mayor Mauricio Domogan is asking the City Council to amend the truck ban ordinance to comply with the Baguio-La Trinidad-Itogon-Sablan-Tuba-Tublay (BLISST) concept of development.
Domogan urged the council to open their eyes on the clamor of vegetable truckers in Benguet.
Augusta Balanoy of the Benguet Farmers Marketing Cooperative said truckers are asking for a total exemption and argued the vegetables from the province is under the food lane program of Department of Agriculture saying vegetable trucks are exempted from truck bans.
Balanoy said Benguet is supplying the whole country, in the north, as far as Batanes and the south, as far as Palawan and General Santos, saying other municipalities and cities does not impose truck ban for vegetables but not from where these vegetables come from, referring to Baguio City and even La Trinidad.
Balanoy said there is an average of 100 trucks daily to be affected with about 800-1 million kilograms of vegetables.
Domogan said he has intimated to the City Council through councilor Benny Bomogao to follow the recommendations of the TTMC and pass a resolution suspending the effect of the new law until amendments are made.
The public hearing weeks ago gathered stakeholders from the city and nearby Benguet who in turn asked for exemption to give way to delivery of goods from the farms to the markets as well as supplies the city also needs.
The truck ban was crafted to minimize traffic congestion in the city.
Balanoy said the ban is ongoing with a number of trucks apprehended last Monday and added the City Council of Baguio proposed to ask for P300 per truck per day as payment for exemption but the truckers refused.
“If they will impose that fee, that high, that means the ordinance seems like a way to collect money from vegetable trucks and is not really to decongest the road,” said Balanoy.