The Department of Agriculture – Philippine Rural Development Project (DA-PRDP) Project Support Office (PSO) North Luzon cluster, through its I-REAP Component, has started conducting reviews of various enterprise subproject proposals from the different regions in the cluster.

At least five (5) proposed business plans/enterprises are scheduled to undergo Joint Technical Reviews (JTR) to be facilitated by reviewers from various components and units from the NPCO, PSO and counterparts from Regional Project Coordination Offices (RPCOs), including I-PLAN, I-BUILD, Social and Environmental Safeguards, Economist, Geomapping and Governance Unit, Monitoring and Evaluation, Finance and Procurement Units.

Two proposals from Region 3, namely, the Corn Silage Production and Marketing and Related Services of Licaong Agriculture Cooperative (LAC), and the Processing and Marketing of Carabao Milk Based Product of Catalanacan Agriculture Multipurpose Cooperative (CAMC), will go through the review from March 8 to 11 at Tarlac City.

Meanwhile, three (3) subprojects were proposed from Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) that are set to be assessed from March 14 to 18 at Baguio City. These subprojects are the Highland Vegetables Hauling and Delivery Services of Apanberang Farmers Association (AFA), Bosigan MPC’s Highland Vegetable Consolidation and Marketing Enterprise of Bosigan Multi-Purpose Cooperative (BMPC), and Carabao Mango Consolidation and Marketing of Abra Vegetables Seed Growers Multi-Purpose Cooperative (AVSG-MPC).

JTRs play an important part in the process of approving new subprojects for possible funding under the DA-PRDP, as it aims to examine the viability of the proposed subprojects, assess the completeness of needed documents, evaluate the capacities of the PGs, and discuss findings to come up with recommendations and issuance of No Objection Letter (NOL) 1 later on. (Ericson Guiao – PSO North Luzon, InfoACE)