More Farm To Market Roads

DA provides P2M financial support to Barugos farm-to-market roads.

Tacloban City - Barugo town’s multi-million farm-to-market road project under the Infrastructure for Rural Productivity Enhancement Sector (InFRES) program of the Department of Agriculture was given P2 million financial support from the provincial government of Leyte.

The amount would provide the additional counterpart fund of the local government unit of Barugo to complete the road construction project that would benefit 14 of the total 37 barangays of the municipality.

The P2 million financial assistance was given by Leyte Governor Carlos Jericho Petilla to Barugo Mayor Alden Avestruz during the former’s latest visit to this Leyte Second District town.

It was learned from Mayor Avestruz that he has been asking the province for counterpart fund of the said INFRES project so it can be realized soon.

The project, funded under the INFRES program of the DA and with other financial support sourced from the national and the beneficiary local government unit, is one of the last phase of INFRES project in the region and is expected to be completed by the middle of 2009.

Mayor Avestruz said the project proposal was five years in the making and was started during the incumbency of then Mayor Juliana Villasin, who now sits as the town’s vice-mayor.

Groundbreaking of the project transpired in October 2008 in Brgy. Hiagsam, Barugo, Leyte, the same time the mayor was assured by the governor of a financial support for the said project from the provincial government.

Also, it was learned in the appraisal report conducted together with the DA Regional Office that Barugo, having a total road network of 113 kilometers of which more than 75 kilometers are barangay roads, most of these are only classified as dirt roads further described as dilapidated and ruined by time and weather.

With this, Mayor Avestruz said, the need to upgrade the present road network is really important as it will directly benefit all the 4, 859 farmers within the subproject areas.

Mayor Avestruz added, they are expecting “increase in farm incomes due to the reduction in transport cost amounting to at least P514 per farmer.”

The bulk of the financing cost of this multi-million project would be from the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The ADB loan proceeds will be utilized in accordance with the financial fund flow of the Infres project.

InFRES project was intended to remove constraints to agricultural productivity by investing in rural infrastructure in regions with high poverty incidence and high agricultural potential. Its immediate objectives are to remove the constraints to the improvement of agricultural productivity caused by the lack or inadequacy of rural infrastructure, and to reduce rural poverty by increasing agricultural productivity and profitability.

There are 9 regions, 41 provinces, 779 municipalities covered by the project in the entire country. Several strategies were identified in the implementation of the project that include participatory approaches applied at all stages of the project implementation; demand driven; strengthened decentralization; improved operation and maintenance and greater transparency through independent project monitoring system.

By Leyte Samar Daily

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