DAVAO CITY -- The Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA) has welcomed the "Balik Probinsya Program" proposed by Senator Christopher Lawrence Go.
On a Facebook post on Friday, MinDA Secretary Emmanuel Piñol said he has been advocating a similar program when he was still North Cotabato governor and when he became the Secretary of the Department of Agriculture (DA).
Go said the whole government should learn from the experiences encountered in the 2019 coronavirus disease (Covid-19) crisis, and provide long-term solutions to stop the current public health emergency and contain the spread of the disease.
Go said his proposal aims to resolve long-standing issues in urban areas, especially Metro Manila, which accelerates the spread of diseases due to highly-dense communities.
The problem, he said, has resulted in faster rate transmission, poor sanitation, overburdened health care facilities and inefficiencies in the delivery of services.
Piñol said that the agency has committed to help the senator in crafting the "Balik Probinsya" Program for Mindanao, taking into consideration the lessons learned from previous initiatives that will encourage people back to their home provinces to mitigate urban congestion problems.
“For example, previous attempts only involved giving urban informal settlers money for their fare back home without any viable program on how they could be reintegrated into a rural setting,” he noted.
Piñol said the failed initiatives in the past had only resulted in families returning to the big cities after their financial incentives had run out.
“Today, with the announced support of President Rody Duterte to the program, MinDA staff will start working on a rural reintegration and income generation program to support the "Balik Probinsya" Program,” he said.
Piñol said that depopulating the urban centers of informal settlers who troop to the big cities to find jobs and income opportunities will "definitely resolve so many social and poverty issues."
“On the other hand, informal urban dwellers who will agree to go back to their home provinces will definitely result in sufficient manpower requirements to undertake food production and rural development activities,” he said. (PNA)
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