The city council on Monday has authorized Mayor Benjamin Magalong through Resolution 148 s. 2020 to sign a memorandum of agreement with the Department of Trade and Industry for the establishment of a meat processing center in Baguio at no cost to the city as the project will be funded under DTI’s Shared-Service Facility (SSF) program.
The project is aligned to the city’s executive-legislative agenda for 2020 to 2022 of promoting livelihood and employment opportunities for the constituents.
The resolution pointed out that most farmers are focused only on learning how to improve livestock production and oftentimes overlook the importance of preventing spoilage of meat from their livestock.
Meat preservation is important in livestock production as it helps farmers or raisers extend meat shelf life and keep freshness of their agricultural and livestock product for more income, and one way of achieving this is through the establishment and operation of a meat processing center.
The facility will address the gaps and bottlenecks in the value chain of priority industry clusters; provide an integrated package of services including enhanced market approaches relevant to the maturity of the micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and the target markets; and develop priority and market-driven industries.
The proposed meat processing center, as proposed by the City Veterinary and Agriculture Office (CVAO), is intended to improve the productivity and competitiveness of small farmers engaged in agribusiness. It will be operated and managed as a cooperative with support personnel from the city government to assist in the project implementation. A designated SSF focal person from the CVAO will oversee implementation of the project and provide continuous technical assistance in terms of efficient ways to use the available resources of the business like labor and capital. DTI is the implementing agency.
In her letter to Vice Mayor Faustino Olowan, City Veterinarian Brigit Piok said that through the SSF project of the DTI, the city can avail funds to purchase tools, machineries, and equipment for the common use of the city’s MSMEs, like the proposed Baguio meat processing center that can be realized through the MOA.
Meanwhile, the body in Resolution 147, s. 2020 has condemned in strongest terms the failure of election of the Philippine Councilors League National and Island Officers for 2020 as declared by its interim national board during the three-day PCL 11th Congress on Feb. 26 to 28.
The resolution considers the technical glitches of the computer system, which was the basis of the board, as insubstantial reason of the declaration. The electoral board and council members should have remedied the situation by resorting to manual voting rather than deciding to postpone the election.
The event was attended by more than 12,000 councilors who were expecting to elect their new set of national and island officers. Each paid a P15,000 registration fee, which was charged against the funds of their respective local government units.
The present PCL membership is more than 17,000 sangguniang bayan/panlungsod members whose creation is recognized under Republic Act 7160 with the purpose of improving public service especially in the legislative aspect of governance.
The resolution also argued that the problem could have been avoided if the computer system was tested for integrity and functionality before the election.
The body commended in a resolution, Saint Louis University for ranking 17th in the Webometrics’ list of 2020 Top 200 Colleges and Universities in the Philippines.
In separate resolutions, the other commendees also in the list are the University of the Philippines Baguio, ranked 40th, the University of the Cordilleras for ranking 59th, and the University of Baguio in 70th rank.
The Webometrics or Ranking Web of Universities is an open scientific exercise performed by the Cybermetrics Lab (Spanish National Research Council) every six months since 2004.
It is an academic ranking of higher education institutions which aims to provide the latest, multidimensional, and useful information about the different universities in the world by measuring each of their performance based on their impact and web presence.
April 19, 2024
