To capacitate Proponent Groups (PG) on monitoring activities and guarantee sense of ownership among beneficiaries, the Project Support Office (PSO) Visayas in collaboration with the Regional Project Coordination Office (RPCO) 6 trained PGs and LGUs from the 19 subprojects in the province of Negros Occidental on the Citizens Monitoring Tool (CMT) being one of the fundamental tools on implementing the projects of the Department of Agriculture-Philippine Rural Development Project (DA-PRDP) from June 6-9, 2023 at the Nature’s Village Resort in Talisay City.

Immersive activities centered on how to utilize the Geotagging Tool and detailed the questionnaire which checks on the quality and safety of implementing the respective subprojects particularly on the construction of the facilities. In this regard, the participants had visited the ongoing construction of the Cauayan Municipal Abattoir and the facility for the I-REAP Subproject Negros Occidental Virgin Coconut Oil Production and Marketing Enterprise at Brgy. Caliling, Cauayan. The site visit allowed the PGs to first-handedly evaluate the implementation and likewise look into safeguarding practices of social and environmental aspects as the project pursues.

Engr. Vanie Tabujara, Project Engineer of the I-REAP Subproject Negros Occidental Virgin Coconut Oil Production and Marketing Enterprise affirms the necessity of conducting the said training.

” .”
[It was an added information for us on what to do with the monitoring on our sites during the implementation of the subproject that could help our community.]

Meanwhile, to intensify the mainstreaming advocacy of PRDP on its tools and processes, Engr. Melvin Hagonob of the DA Regional Agricultural Engineering Division (RAED) shared his insights on how the monitoring tool would be as useful to the regular and banner programs of the department.

“The CMT is an important innovation of the PRDP in order to achieve efficient and sustainable project implementation. As we all know we have many projects of the Department of Agriculture under the different banner programs. These projects include agricultural buildings, farm to market roads same with PRDP, small scale irrigation projects and other agri-infrastructure projects. This tool will indeed encourage public participation as well as social responsibility.”

Further, Hagonob intends to introduce the tool to the implementation division of the DA regular program to head start the incorporation of CMT.

The three-day activity on CMT likewise gave way for the PGs to plan on how to level off their monitoring activities in hopes of achieving sustainability.(Eunice Gregorio, Writer, RPCO 6)