Bagobuk Community Multi-purpose Cooperative
The revival of the cooperative is credited to The Reverend Father Mario Palanca, a Catholic priest who typifies today’s "activist" clergy. He holds an MBA from the Asian Institute of Management and is an avid mountain-climber whose main passion in life is the preservation of Palawan’s "last frontier."
The BCMPC has been granted a 5,000-hectare tract of virgin forest by the Department of Natural Resources under its Community-based Forest Management Program (CBFMP), located about 4 km from "downtown" Napsan. This tract of land will be the site of a number of projects, including planting a nursery; organic vegetable and fruit gardening; planting and processing of cash crops (mangoes, cashew, calamansi, cocoa, coffee, jackfruit, guyabano, etc.); processing of fish; producing organic fertilizer; fresh-water fish culture; and community-based sustainable eco-tourism.
Disadvantaged, Depressed, Under-served. (A retired teacher believes that this designation should include the letter "N" - for NEGLECTED.) This state of abject poverty has been a boon to the illegal loggers and fishing operators who dangle many opportunities to make quick, easy cash.
And yet, any first-time visitor to Napsan will immediately be struck by the apparent contradiction: lush, verdant vegetation dominated by cash crops such as mangoes, cashews, coconuts, bananas, jackfruit, sweet potatoes and guyabano, as well as seas that are considered "under-fished" - prompting one to ask, "But why is this village so poor?"
The answer lies in its ISOLATION. The roads from Puerto Princesa to Napsan are so bad that owners and operators of the few jeepneys that ply the route often spend more on repairs than what they earn from each trip. There are three "nasty" rivers to cross, most notorious of which is the Montible River, within the Iwahig Penal Colony. During the rainy season, the dirt roads turn into mud and mush, and even if a vehicle does manage to navigate the treacherous terrain, there are landslides.
The high cost of farm-to-market transportation (now averaging 1 Peso per kilo), the absence of electricity and the high cost of ice are disincentives for the farmers and fishermen to make any serious effort to carve a decent livelihood out of the abundant natural riches. Indeed, two of the biggest ironies are: (1) the soil is rich, where virtually anything grows, and yet, most of the basic household needs - vegetables, spices, fresh fruits - have to be purchased from the City market; (2) the seas of Napsan are considered under-fished, because the fishermen are too poor to afford motorized bancas, much less, equipment and implements to allow them to fish beyond three kilometers offshore.
Napsan - the site of a National High School, an Elementary School, a Day Care Center, and a Satellite Health Clinic - also suffers from neglect, particularly by the education authorities. On any given school week, both high school and elementary school students can be seen loitering, rather than in school. The reason? Teachers have a penchant for attending "seminars" and "conferences" in the City that seem to occur two to three days out of each school week! Is it any wonder, then, that graduating Napsan high-school students sport one of the country’s lowest passing rates for college-entrance examinations?
As if this state of poverty and neglect were not enough, Napsan "enjoys" the unenviable reputation as "the malaria capital of the Philippines." Other common ailments are gastro-intestinal, skin infections, and respiratory.
(1) Providing alternative means to augment basic education and training
(2) Creating viable, sustainable livelihood projects that are environment-friendly
(3) Protecting the environment and natural resources - specifically, the forests and the seas - through education, training, and model projects
(4) Promoting health and nutrition
(2) Extra-curricular Tutorial Center, thru the Jesuit Volunteers Philippines Foundation (JVP). Two volunteer teachers will be providing after-school, non-formal education - tutorial services focused on reading/writing/comprehension in English. Students will come from the elementary and high school; classes in English for adults will also be provided. Two classrooms will be set up at the Parish Church multi-purpose building.
(2) Organic gardening (vegetables and fruits)
(3) Producing, marketing organic fertilizers (thru the use of the "handyman shredder")
(4) Plant and maintain a nursery for forest and fruit trees which will serve as a source of planting materials for reforestation and agroforestry farms
(5) Piggery & poultry; waste by-products will be used for organic fertilizer, as well as converted into bio-mass energy
(Note: Projects 2, 3, 4, & 5 will be managed by women.)
(2) Ice plant (to be powered by a hybrid system of wind, solar, and coconut shell energy), in partnership with CRREE and Shell
(3) Community-based sustainable eco-tourism, possibly under the UNESCO CBST initiative; women will manage this project.
(2) Money to pay for Perla Manapol’s consultancy services as Business Adviser/Liaison Officer (aka "CBO - Chief Begging Officer") - US$25,000 for one year. Ms. Manapol has worked pro bono for the BCMPC since January 2000.
(3) Handy Shredder (for organic gardening)
(4) Garden tools and implements
(5) Starter sets for piggery and poultry projects
(6) 50,000 pcs. plastic bags (8 x 11") for seedling beds
(7) Vegetable seedlings (sweet corn, sitaw, tomatoes, cucumber, sweet peppers, okra, onions, eggplants, cabbage, pechay, cabbage, radish)
(8) Blackboard (2) for tutorial center
(9) Manual typewriter (2); typewriter ribbons
(10) Manual mimeograph machine, stencil, printing paper
(11) Office supplies (paper, pens/pencils, calculators, staplers/staples, etc.)
(12) PHP 50,000 to support our Tutorial Center for 10 months (includes monthly allowances for two volunteer teachers, along with teaching aids and other school supplies)
(2) Two-week, all-expense-paid training at a model multi-purpose farm in Laguna for six co-op members, under the sponsorship of the Elena P. Tan Foundation; trainees will then become trainers for the rest of the Barangay in livelihood projects such as poultry, piggery, fish-water culture, organic gardening/fertilizers, planting/maintaining a nursery
(3) Manual cashew de-shellers, from the Helena P. Tan Foundation
(4) Feasibility studies on the eradication of malaria mosquitoes to be financed by the Helena P. Tan Foundation
(5) Hand tractor, portable rice miller, portable rice thresher, and water pump from the Office of the Mayor, Puerto Princesa City
(6) Twenty (20) sacks of rice, 10 bags of cement, iron railings, and 200-meter hose (for water pump) from the Office of the Governor, Palawan
(7) The Mayor of Puerto Princesa has also acted as Guarantor for a PHP200,000 loan from the Land Bank of the Philippines; the money will be used for buying/selling of copra and rice
(8) Mr. Abraham Cu, Sr., President of Han Gang Corp. (and founder of the Renewable Energy Association of the Philippines), is donating a solar panel to be used for lighting the workers’ shelter, and insulation material for a multi-purpose building, at the cacao demo farm.
Note: Grant Proposals have been submitted to other groups and institutions, both in the public and private sectors.
Stopped illegal logging practices of local residents within the 5,000-hectare tract of land.