LINGAYEN, Pangasinan—This province has taken pride in receiving a national honor for the fourth time as one of the few provinces in the country to be conferred with the 2016 Rice Achievers Awards.
Aside from Pangasinan, the provinces of La Union, Nueva Vizcaya, Bulacan, Nueva Ecija, Lanao del Norte and Compostela Valley were also cited by the Department of Agriculture.
All seven provinces received trophies and P4 million in cash prizes each with Senator Cynthia A. Villar, chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Food, conferring the awards.
It can be recalled that Pangasinan has been elevated to the awards’ Hall of Fame in 2015 after it bagged honors for three consecutive years—2012, 2013, and 2014.
Pangasinan Gov. Amado “Pogi” I. Espino III was represented by Vice Gov. Jose Ferdinand Z. Calimlim, Jr., Provincial Agriculture Officer-In-Charge Dalisay Moya, and Acting Assistant Provincial Agriculturist Nestor Batalla during the awarding rites at the PICC in Manila.
Espino earlier said the provincial government is doing its best to continuously implement the programs and projects initiated by his father, former governor and current 5th District Rep. Amado T. Espino Jr.
The incumbent governor vowed to launch new undertakings that could propel Pangasinan into becoming an agro-industrial province.
The Rice Achievers Award, which started in 2011, is under the National Rice Program of DA, and recognizes the outstanding and significant contributions of the local government units, irrigators associations, agricultural extension workers, and local farm technicians to the Philippine rice industry.
It aims to capture the impact of DA’s rice production program interventions towards achieving self-sufficiency.
Statistics show Pangasinan remains the food basket of Region 1, as it supplies 62 percent of rice in the Ilocos Region, as well as 65 percent of corn, 82 percent of eggplants, 78 percent of mangoes, and 86 percent of fish.
As such, the provincial government has endeavored to transform Pangasinan into a self-sufficient province in terms of agriculture. It has established various undertakings such as organizing farmers groups to plant certified seeds, sustaining maintenance of irrigation support facilities and services, and farm mechanization programs, among others.
In his first State of the Province Address last May 11, Gov. Pogi stressed the provincial government will do its best to continue the programs and projects of the previous administration, as he cited the need to have processing plants and agro-industrial facilities in Pangasinan.