The Weekly Vanguard 13th issue 9th issue | Page 9

Dec. 12- 17, 2016

Elmer V. Recuerdo

TACLOBAN CITY-- Christmas came early for thirty families from the fishing community of Costa Brava, in Tacloban City when they received solar kits to provide basic electricity yesterday, over three years since super typhoon Yolanda leveled their homes and infrastructure.

Costa Brava is one of the few remaining communities in the heart of Tacloban still without on-grid electricity due to the slow pace of reconstruction in areas severely affected by Yolanda. The coastal community is among the worst hit during typhoon Yolanda with hundreds died from storm surge.

The Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities( ICSC), in partnership with the housing rights group Urban Poor Associates, the UKbased charity Christian Aid, and the Costa Brava Homeowners Association, distributed the 30 Niwa solar home systems, which each came with three 300-lumen LED lamps, a nine-inch table fan, a solar panel and a battery.

Nineteen-year-old Elma Ocenar said the lights and fan were much needed especially by her one-year-old daughter Mecaella. The two had to make do with a gas lamp and an old, malfunctioning solar lamp since leaving Labrador, Pangasinan last year to join her fisherman husband in Costa Brava.

“ We found it hard to adjust when we came here

Vanguard

In Yolanda affected areas

Solar power lights up homes

because we weren’ t used to living without electricity,” Ocenar said.“ My baby wants me to fan her throughout her sleep, as she was used to sleeping with an electric fan. And she would get so afraid of the dark that she’ d cry.”

Costa Brava’ s homeowners’ association struck a payment deal with the abovementioned civil society groups for the solar kits. They would pay P85 per week over the next two years to pay for the kits’ total cost of P8,700, according to ICSC project coordinator Arturo Tahup.

“ Their payments will go to their solidarity fund. Part of the money will be used to run solar street lights, assemble new solar TekPaks, and launch new Solar Scholars trainings,” he said, referring to trainings for Yolanda survivors to learn how to use the TekPaks, or portable solar suitcases, especially in

Gen. Danny D. Lim, AFP( ret) & Rebolusyonaryong Alyansang Makabansa( RAM) & RAM Guardians Incorporated- Alakdan

times of disasters.

Civil society groups are urging the government to incorporate small renewable energy systems in humanitarian and reconstruction work because they are easy to deploy, as well as because they set the path towards the future low-carbon development of affected communities. In the case of Costa Brava, the solar home systems offer remedy to their lack of electricity access.

“ The people of Costa Brava have proven that through their own efforts, they can light up their homes on their own. And this light is fueled not by dirty fuels but by renewable energy,” he said.

The Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities is a policy group in the Philippines promoting low-carbon development strategies, sustainable energy solutions and fair climate policy in vulnerable countries.#

Season’ s Greetings

from

( Reflectors... from p. 7)

coco peat; the coco shell into granulated charcoal and, further, into clean coco gas that can energize the processing plant, or even the communities adjacent to the plant. These are highly marketable products and trends in their individual demand are notably rising, both in the domestic and export markets. And the technologies to turn out these products are all locally available. Details of a re-engineered coconut industry that promises windfalls to farmers and farm workers are discussed in a program called SUNRISE developed by this author and two colleagues. We will discuss SUNRISE in a separate column.

Meanwhile, creating these social enterprises would require public and private investments in integrated coconut processing plants to manufacture the foregoing products. The local government units in principally coconut-producing provinces can invest in said facilities and lease these to farmers’ organizations wanting to benefit from value-adding, in the process creating local employment opportunities. The banks, though, have to participate in terms of financing. The Philippine Coconut Authority has had a program in this direction but bureaucratic meddling, let alone the lack of technical knowledge among those at the helm of the PCA, stood in the way.

Under a re-engineered industry, farmers can deliver their nuts direct to the social enterprises engaged in processing, by-passing the intermediaries. The latter can buy whole nuts even at a pickup, tree-top pricing scheme, based on the price per nut

( From Vintage... p. 7)

Visayans, our nearest contender for the label for some time, have now decidedly called their language as CE- BUANO or SUGBUANON.

The first step to strengthening our self-identity as an ethnic group in Eastern Visayas is to straighten out, preferably through reinstatement, the original cultural labels on our people( WARAYWARAY) and on our language( BINISAYA), before these were gradually garbled and bastardized with modified jargon since the 1950s.#

( From Voices... p. 7)

personal and social quagmire that is AIDS. As it is a cross-cutting issue, the solution must not only be a holistic approach with political will and sufficient funding but also behavioral changes, forgiveness and compassion at individual level. #

9 prevailing in the locality. With this pricing system, farmers save on labor costs associated with harvesting, nut-gathering, nut removal, and copra drying, enabling them to raise their revenues considerably. These are costs the processing plant can well absorb arising from the high value-added that processing generates. Results of feasibility studies made by a local consulting firm for a civil society group with affiliate coconut farmers’ organizations in Quezon Province reveal that the gross value-added, excluding sales of processed coir fiber and coco peat, comes to an estimated Php31.00 per kilonut, or Php124.00 per four nuts which produce an equivalent one kilogram of copra.

A re-engineered coconut industry would lay down the foundation for rural industrialization, thereby creating enormous employment and income opportunities in the rural areas where over 80 percent of the Philippine poor are located. This may yet effectively address the exodus of rural labor to the urban centers in search of employment opportunities which are hard to come by in the rural areas. Indeed, rural industrialization may yet decongest the urban centers like Metro Manila, in effect easing such urban problems as mounting garbage, traffic jams, squatting and even crimes against persons and properties.

• Finally, let the Philippine Congress pass the Bangsamoro statute into law so that peace can reign in Muslim Mindanao, and pave the way for the unhampered development of its full potentials. Likewise, conclude peace agreements with the CPP-NPA.

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