The Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP) road project beneficiaries and barangay officials of Barangay Lampitak and Barangay Albagan in the town of Tampakan were empowered with their participation in project implementation.

This was after learning their duties and responsibilities as part of the Citizen Monitoring Team (CMT) during the training conducted by the Regional Project Coordinating Office (RPCO) XII and Project Support Office (PSO) Mindanao led by the Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Unit, last week.

The CMT training enables project beneficiaries to become part in the monitoring and evaluation of subprojects under PRDP. It also gives the participants a sense of ownership of the project implemented within their community.

The training was joined by barangay officials of the two barangays, community leaders, and farmers.

PRDP and Local Government Unit (LGU)-Tampakan jointly-funded the Concreting of Lampitak-Albagan Farm-to-Market Road (FMR), which will benefit almost five hundred farming families living in the area. Construction of the FMR subproject started last October 2022 and will now progress with the community’s participation.

Danilo Bondad, a resident of Sunflower A, Lampitak, said that they are thankful for the CMT Training because they now understood their role as participants in project implementation.

“We are more conscious right now of our role… we will work hand in hand with the contractors and our engineers from the LGU,” Bondad added.

Rizalito Garcia, a village leader, also commended the CMT saying that this strategy is also applicable with other government projects implemented in their area.

“I am the leader of the barangay agrarian reform council and I will surely recommend CMT to other project implementers,” Garcia said. (Carl Ulysses Aguillon | RPCO 12)