RECOGNITION for the best gardens during the Covid-19 pandemic is being pushed by the Baguio City Council as a means to inspire residents.
Councilor and Association of Barangay Councils president Michael Lawana, in a resolution, is requesting the Office of the City Mayor to recognize certain barangays of the city that displayed ingenuity, innovation and self-reliance in establishing their survival community gardens and household container gardens during the Covid–19 pandemic.
“Clearly, the Covid–19 pandemic is unfolding at a critical juncture in our nation’s as well as in our city’s history. Thankfully, in the face of such a gargantuan crisis, residents as well as the barangays have reached deep within themselves to find ingenious ways of rising to the challenge. A foremost example is the establishment and the creation of the survival community garden and household container gardens in the barangays of the city of Baguio a simple yet expedient means of mitigating the pandemic’s impact across the food system,” Lawana said.
The government with the Department of Agriculture and the local agricultural office with the City Veterinary Office have distributed over 20,000 various vegetable seedlings to barangays in the city in the hope to establish “survival community gardens” and “household container gardens,” in each household.
“In order to recognize and distinguish barangays, the office of the city mayor through The City Agricultural Office and City Veterinary Office are earnestly requested to conduct a search for the ingenious and innovative survival community gardens and household container gardens in the barangays of Baguio,” Lawana said.
In an approved measure, the City Agricultural Office, City Veterinary Office and the assistance from the Liga ng mga Barangay was asked to formulate the guidelines, criteria and program components of the search taking into consideration the utmost objective and purpose of the search which is the mitigation of the pandemic’s impact across the food system especially in barangays.
“It is also the utmost concern of the legislative to request the office of the mayor to provide incentive in whatever form t these ingenious and innovative “Survival community gardens” and “Household Container Gardens” in each barangay,” Lawana said.
During the duration of the enhanced community quarantine and the ongoing general community quarantine, market supply chain and trade disruption have restricted peoples access to sufficient and nutritious sources of food amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
The survival gardens are aimed to save families in case of a food supply shortage and aims to sustain the supply of vegetables in the coming months in barangays and households that have spaces or container gardens.
Seeds given consist of spinach, green shinkang pechay, lettuce, cucumber, beans, bell pepper, okra, and kangkong.