In
preparation to the emergence of the One-ASEAN economy, the Department ofAgrarian Reform-Provincial Office of Cagayan-Batanes (DARPO Cagayan-Batanes)
and the Cagayan State University (CSU) have entered into an agreement to
provide business development extension services to members agrarian reform
beneficiaries’ organizations on the province of Cagayan.
It
is an undeniable fact that globalization and trade liberalization are already
affecting the way local economies are performing. In these cut-throat business
competition, victory shall be achieved only by those who are prepared to meet
the challenges of open market competition.
Building
social enterprises manned by agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) are now being
undertaken by the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) by strengthening the
capabilities of peoples’ organizations, cooperatives and individual
farmer-beneficiaries by transforming them from operators of partitioned cluster
farms into united producers and managers of large production scale, plantation
type farmer-entrepreneurs.
In
order to make the once small farm tenants now small landowners-cultivators
competitive, the DAR has partnered with
the Cagayan State University-College of Business Entrepreneurship and
Accountancy (CSU-CBEA) to provide trainings and assistance in the preparation
of financial statements, drafting of feasibility studies/business proposals and
business management, among others, in favor of marginalized farmer-beneficiaries
in agrarian reform beneficiaries’ organizations.
These
activities will further improve the capabilities of these organizations and
cooperatives to access loans from the Land Bank of the Philippines and other
financing institutions to enable them to improve and expand their business
operations to meet the demands of economies of scale.
The
DAR-CSU/CBEA partnership to this effect was formalized through a Memorandum of
Agreement (MOA) executed on January 28, 2014 by and between the DAR Regional
Director, Atty. Marjorie P. Ayson; CSU President Romeo Quilang; and Provincial
Agrarian Reform Program Officer (PARPO) Virgilio M. Acasili. Other officials of
the DAR, CSU, and the various ARBOs and cooperatives witnessed the MOA signing.
/christiandsales
