IF A line agency goes where its topmost leadership goes, then the Department of Agriculture (DA) has come to have a leader of leaders in the person of its new Secretary, Dr. William D. Dar.
Without hesitations, I must say Dr. Dar is a perfect choice for the post entrusted to him now, the Philippines being basically an agricultural country economically and culturally. We have to be globally competitive in this particular line of livelihood wherein Dr. Dar is most fitted.
Speaking of him as a leader, the man is excellency confident, creative and thoughtful of his colleagues and subordinates. As to the works he has accepted, I can vouch for his knowledge and skill and patriotism. He must have accepted it with unstinted zest and love for the Philippine farmers and their beneficiaries.
For the job, he had prepared himself well. A doctor of horticulture from UP at Los Baños, Laguna as a PCAARRD scholar and a TOYM awardee while still mentoring at the Mountain State agricultural College (MSAC) which soon became Benguet State University by presidential decree, through undeniably his excellently performing tandem at the College of Agriculture with then President Fortunato Aglibut Battad.
Dr. Dar as leader can be briefly featured as confident, creative, and thoughtful; more briefly, a man of values, as Dr. Grace Saguba Bengwayan would put it.
I do not anymore entertain any iota of doubt of what I had said of him some year ago.
In fact, I am more convinced of my prophetic portrayal of him. Therefore, like would here to highlight again qualities in the man as an executive officer that are of value for edification and imitation of young Filipinos in offices and the field. There are three of them in particular: self-assurance, creativity, and thoughtfulness of colleagues and subordinates.
Dr. Dar is thoroughly self-assured in his job. He feels he is there because he knows what he is assigned to do and how to do it. This self-assurance gives him self-confidence that frees him from looking at his colleagues and subordinates as potential rivals or competitors in the profession.
It is perhaps this freedom that gives him clear-sightedness in detecting people with special abilities to be put in appropriate positions or offices and the concomitant generosity to send them for further studies and training courses in accordance with programmed personnel and office development.
Manpower development for him is always purposive, including the giving chance for the person to uplift his condition and those he comes across in turn.
Dr. Dar is well disposed in avoiding being embroiled in situations creating conflict of interest and this makes him creative in the performance of his job. He is not content with succeeding into position or in an office. He creates positions or offices to meet future needs and accordingly prepares needed budget in time. Examples are the Highland Agriculture and Resources Research Department of Agriculture (DA-BAR).
As many would agree with me, Dr. Dar’s stint with a Cabinet Rank in the Department of Agriculture and at the Office of the President, Malacañang Palace, although relatively brief, was equally commendable and appreciated.
A third very laudable element in Dr. Dar’s character is the once he chooses you to take charge of a work and you accept; he expects you to give your whole-hearted commitment to excel and perform to the best of your ability. No undue interference on his part. Good performance is given due recognition; poor performance is given appropriate needed remedy and encouragement to do better. No finger-pointing. But service and fulfillment of expectation is for him paramount.
In giving his message, the Speaker articulated his keen and lasting memories of co-workers in his own institution, a sign of thoughtfulness. He would mention their names and recall good deeds done. The history of BSU was at his fingertips, so to speak. He pinpointed priority directions the University can take and enumerated ways and means how to excel to win in a globalized environment.
The challenge Dr. Dar posed to BSU now with a number of “windows of opportunity” is to prepare the kind of students and farmers that the future needs not only in the Cordillera and Ilocos regions, but in the rest of the country, and in Asia. I know he hopes to see the Philippines launch a new age, compete, and win in a globalized world. He had shown his mettle in that as Director General of the UN’s Institute of Crop Research for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) in India until he retired.