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Lifestyle, p9
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Visayanbizpost
Breaking news in the countryside
Visayan Business Post website visayanbizpost.com
Vol. I, No. 2
11 Sections
the World, p7
P12 Monday, 26 May 2014
Inside
Special Report
The VBP News Team
Tacloban City, Leyte
Entertainment, p10
Parenting, p10
Industry, p5
Harvest Season.
Rice farmers in rural Leyte begin harvesting and threshing out rice in time for the enrollment season where
most proceeds from farming revenue usually go after summer. Photo by Jn Grey
TACLOBAN, Leyte – The
race is on for the immediate
recovery of small and medium enterprises lost to super
typhoon Yolanda in Eastern
Visayas.
Trade and Industry Regional Director Cynthia Reyes
Nierras told the VBP News
Team that DTI has determined that the region’s small
and medium enterprises sector suffered greatly from super typhoon Haiyan. These
SME’s, according to Nierras,
need to recover fast in order
to help investors and people
working in the businesses
economically recover.
Nierras further told VBP
that part of DTI’s ‘Tindog
Eastern Visayas’ (Rise East-
DTI: EV need fast SME recovery
Available soft loans pushed for return of micro and medium enterprises
ern Visayas) program is the
continued close monitoring
of prices of basic commodities and making sure that
supply is stabilised while
quality of goods being sold in
the typhoon-hit areas do not
decline especially in the local
construction industry.
“The bringing of basic products into the areas hit by the
super typhoon was made easy
through the caravan sale and
facilitation of transport of
goods from Luzon and other
areas into the region with the
help of the Department of Social Welfare, Department of
Transportation and Communication, and Office of Civil
Defense. Supply has become
normal now and this status is
helping a lot of people feel better”, added director Nierras.
Tourism down across Visayas,
‘voluntourism’ up in Tacloban
The BVP News Team, Western Visayas
CEBU –– Officials in Sta. Fe town in Bantayan
have reported that tourist numbers have fallen
during the Holy Week, compared to previous
years, in the wake of damage caused by super typhoon Yolanda.
Despite the good weather,
Sta. Fe Mayor Jose Esgana
estimated that tourist numbers were down this week
by 30 to 35%. The town, he
said, had around 350 rooms
for visitors before Yolanda
struck. However, less than
300 were currently available
as repairs to some resorts
were still ongoing.
Esgana said it would likely take 2 to 6 years before
their tourist industry could
fully recover, even with help
from the National Government.
In Bohol, more than 5
months after the devastating earthquake in October
last year, the region has also
suffered major reduction in
tourist numbers.
Carmen Bohol Mayor Jun
Turibio said recently that
the number of visitors to the
Chocolate Hills National
Monument, a region hoping
to be named as a World Heritage Site, has decreased by
“almost 50 percent.”
Before the quake, we
would get as many as 4,000
visitors a day, he said, but
major aftershocks, as recent
as February 21st, were discouraging tourists from returning.
However, Joshue Hinay,
Bohol Island Tour Guides
Association of the Philippines president said, from
his point of view, the drop in
tourism was more like 85%.
“For
tourist
guides
like me, it’s at 85%. We
Tourism down/p3
Identified needs
To efficiently help small
and medium enterprises, DTI
has identified their immediate
needs. “Part of this is the need
to provide access to technology and market, proper product
development, and enhancing
the supply chain”, said Nierras.
Technology, Nierras clarified, include stress debriefing
and technical training. The
DTI has a Small and Medium
Enterprises Roving Academy
or SMERA being used for this
purpose.
Businesses however asked
government for financial assistance so that they could
immediately restart their operations, since most of them
went down to negative capiSmall and medium/p2
Bottled water. Mahaplag, Leyte sneaks into the thriving
water business with its natural mountain water. (VBPNT)
Government releases P802M to Yolanda areas
The VBP News Team
Leyte
MANILA – True to the earlier assurance by Leyte Governor Leopoldo ‘Mic’ Petilla,
Malacañang has announced it
will release soon all of P1.791
billion initially earmarked for
the rehabilitation of vital infrastructures like municipal
buildings, public markets,
health and other civic centres’
considered as critical to governance in Haiyan-hit provinces and municipalities.
“The buildings are needed
to facilitate the full normalisation of local government services”, according to Secretary
of the Interior Manuel Roxas
II as he visited to hand over
checks amounting to P802
million to various local governments in the Visayas.
Roxas visited the province
of Leyte where he personally handed the checks to local government officials who
were able to earlier submit
to the Department of the Interior and Local Government
required documents for the
rehabilitation of their municipal buildings.
Roxas disclosed that the
biggest amount of funds released was P230M which is to
be spent on immediate repairs
Ormoc to reform Investment Code NIA, DENR forge
The VBP News Team
North Leyte
Ormoc City –– Recognizing the steady flow of investments and the need to keep
them in, city mayor Edward
S. Codilla has created an executive commitee to look into
possible reforms that will
eventually update the city’s
Investment Incentives Code.
City licensing chief Emilio
Tingson disclosed to the Business Post that the technical
committee, composed of rep-
resentatives from the