SGA barangays get farming equipment from BARMM
BANGSAMORO NEWS UPDATES • 16:15 PM Tue Apr 25, 2023
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By:
John M. Unson
The farming equipment was turned over to beneficiaries by the Bangsamoro government Monday. (John Unson)
COTABATO CITY - Cross-section efforts to boost productivity of farmers, some of them former Moro guerillas, in 13 underdeveloped barangays got a boost with a multi-million government farming equipment support.
Bangsamoro Chief Minister Ahod B. Ebrahim and Regional Local Government Minister Naguib G. Sinarimbo together turned over on Monday brand new tractors, mechanized rice planters, corn and rice harvesters, and 300 units of motorized fishing boats to the Association of Barangays in 13 barangays in Midsayap, Cotabato.
The event was held at the capitol of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao in the southeast of this city.
In separate messages, Sinarimbo and Ebrahim assured of BARMM’s continuing focus on interventions meant to address poverty and underdevelopment in barangays made impoverished by decades of secessionist strife.
The farming equipment grant to residents of the 13 predominantly Moro barangays that belong to BARMM’s Special Geographic Area in Cotabato, a component-province of Administrative Region 12, was part of the Bangsamoro Integrated Rehabilitation and Development (BIRD) program of the Ministry of the Interior and Local Government.
Sinarimbo, who is at the helm of MILG, is also overseeing BARMM’s quick deployment Rapid Emergency Action on Disaster Incidence that has teams of well-equipped calamity and disaster responders.
Midsayap Mayor Rolly C. Sacdalan said he is grateful to Sinarimbo and Ebrahim for helping the residents of SGA barangays in their municipality bounce back from the effects of armed conflicts in decades past.
“These barangays that originally belonged to Midsayap that are now under the autonomous region are lucky. The local government unit of Midsayap, which is under Region 12, will support these development efforts of BARMM. Farmers in these SGA barangays sell their farm products to traders in the center of Midsayap. There is correlation among them obviously,” Sacdalan said.
The farm equipment that Ebrahim and Sinarimbo released to residents of 13 barangays in Midsayap in Monday’s symbolic rite is comprised of 10 tractors for rice and corn production, 10 rice and corn harvesters, eight combine harvesters and 300 motorized fishing boats with gears.
Some of the 13 barangays that benefited from MILG’s BIRD livelihood equipment support are close to the 220,000-hectare Liguasan Delta, from where central Mindanao provinces get daily supply of fresh water fishes.