One of the Department of Agriculture – Philippine Rural Development Project’s (DA-PRDP) priorities in identifying and preparing subprojects is its sustainability; ensuring that infrastructures and facilities established under the project can be beneficial to the generations to come.

To make certain of it, the project initiated a number of instruments and one of which is the Citizens Monitoring Tool (CMT). On July 11-12, 2023, the DA-PRDP facilitated the Citizens Monitoring Training to an onion cold storage enterprise subproject proponent group (PG) in Talavera, Nueva Ecija.

_{Members of the proponent group, BAMC, inspect the construction of the onion cold storage facility based on the specification of its design and construction practices.}

Representatives from the Bantug Agricultural Multi-Purpose Cooperative (BAMC) and other cooperatives under the clustered group for the subproject underwent a two-day training that enables them to aid in ensuring that the construction of the P99-million onion cold storage facility as the major component of their enterprise subproject through DA-PRDP will progress within the prescribed designs, standards, and timeline.

The Citizens Monitoring involves the PG looking into the 60,000-bag capacity onion cold storage facility’s quality in terms of the design, manpower, equipment, and construction practices and its compliance to mitigating measures against potential adverse effects to nearby households and the environment. RPCO 3 Rural Infrastructure Engineer Romel Tiangco discussed the quality assurance elements of the subproject while Social and Environmental Safeguards (SES) Officer Jesusa Surla identified the social and environmental concerns that might arise during the construction.

To offer an effective avenue for expressing concerns, SES Officer Surla also demonstrated the Grievance Redress Mechanism (GRM) which is a locally based formal method where a resolution to grievance or feedback is sought and provided. This provides opportunities for problems to be resolved more efficiently.

“The GRM is important because there would be a system in place on who we would air out our concers when needed,” said Feliciana Santos, a member of the BAMC.

_{GIS Officer Alvin Mariano shows the members of the Citizens Monitoring Team the geotag photos posted by the contractor as part of their monitoring checklist.}

RPCO 3 Geographic Information System Officer Alvin Mariano introduced the PRDP Geotagging tool which will be used to gather pictures and videos that holds the location, date, and time during the conducted monitoring activity.

“It is a big thing that we learned about geotagging. It would be very useful everytime we will monitor the construction of the facility,” added Santos.

The DA-PRDP Regional Project Coordination 3 led the training for the CMT that aims to boost the PG’s ownership to the process of implementation and eventually increasing their stake to the sustainability of their subprojects by involving them in the monitoring.

Members of the proponent group expressed their anticipation in finishing the facility and be able to use it to help them increase their income by having the option to store a portion of their harvest and avoid surplus which results to a cheaper price of onions.

“This cold storage would be the solution to the fluxing price of onion whenever we would have a surplus or lack of supply. Now that we will soon have this facility, farmers in Talavera would enjoy higher income,” said BAMC Manager Nora Angeles. ### Ram Bautista, RPCO 3 InfoACE