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Department of Agriculture headed by Secretary William Dar gave seeds and fertilizers worth P175.9 million for Bulacan province after he saw how typhoon “Ulysses” battered the agricultural land.
Dar made an ocular inspection with Governor Daniel Fernando in Pulilan town on Friday.
Dar and Fernando then proceeded to the Command Center of the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (PDRRMO)’s and continue to oversee the status of other agricultural lands. It was followed by a dialogue with the farmer’s leader and press briefing during Damage Assessment on Agriculture and Fisheries due to the onslaught of said typhoon.
During the dialogue, Sec. Dar hand over to Gov. Fernando the Certificate of Award amounting to P175.923 million worth of seeds and fertilizers for Bulakenyo farmers.
Gigi Carilio, head of the Provincial Agriculture’s Office in her report to Gov Fernando it was learned that the affected riceland area is 12,000 hectares all under reproductive and maturity stage.
These ricelands are located all at the North Zone part of Bulacan located in the First and Second District.
The farmers at South Zone part were unaffected by the typhoon after they were not able to plant due to non-water supply from the National Irrigation Administration (NIA).
More than 1,000 hectares of vegetables farm were also affected mostly from the towns of San Ildefonso, San Miguel and San Rafael.
Fernando said that as of Friday 1:00pm they are still gathering the data and figures from every local municipalities and cities for the official total amount of damages in agricultural industry.
The said seeds and fertilizers aid include 15,000 bags of Hybrid Rice Seeds worth P67 million; 15,100 bags of RCEF Certified Seeds worth P22,952,000; 2,918 bags of Expanded Inbred CS worth P4,435,360; 45,000 bags of Fertilizers for Hybrid worth P45 million; 30,200 bags of fertilizer for RCEF worth P30.2 million and 5,836 bags of fertilizer for Expanded Inbred amounting to P5,836,000 with a total of P175,923,000.
Meanwhile, Dar assured the Filipino people of enough rice supply for the next three months and no need to worry of rice shortage.
The secretary also announced the good news wherein non-rice farmers such as coconut farmers, corn farmers, sugarcane farmers and even indigenous farmers nationwide will also receive P5,000 each from the allocated P4.5 billion of DA.
“We will give more aid in many ways, nandyan ang ating gobyerno na handang tumulong at magbigay pag-asa. Let us be one and united sa pagbangon,” Dar said.
Dar added the total worth of agriculture damage and losses left by typhoons Pepito, Quinta, Rolly and Ulysses almost reached to P10 billion.
He said, because of the early warning system, announcements and collaboration with the concerned government agencies, the farming industry was able to save from damages worth P31 billion of agricultural crops due to early advisories.
Fernando on his part expressed his gratitude to Sec Dar for always supporting the province of Bulacan in this trying times.
The governor said, the provincial government are now preparing to help affected Bulakenyos not only farmers due of typhoon Ulysses.
According to Rowena Joson-Tiongson, head of the Provincial Social Welfare and Development Office, the governor immediately ordered them to provide hot meals and relief packs to all the evacuees.
They are currently planning on how to distribute reliefs to all other affected Bulakenyos in the next days.
Fernando said that after distributing relief goods to affected Bulakenyos due to typhoons Pepito and Quinta, they only have nine thousand readily available relief goods remaining.
“Nagpahanda tayo ng karagdagan 10,000 pang relief foods at nagrequest na rin tayo ng tulong sa DSWD national para sa 200,000 Bulakenyong apektado ng bagyong Ulysses at agad naman silang tumugon, ” Fernando saidBased on the latest situational report from the PDRRMO, there are 4,698 families or 14,517 individuals that are currently housed in 49 evacuation centers from 20 towns and three cities in the province.