Community participation sustains town's resiliency
By Monica Piquero-Tan
San Francisco, Camotes Islands, Cebu, Philippines - Community based initiatives like capacitating members of Local Disaster Risk Reduction & Management Councils (LDRRMC) through trainings & seminars conducted by Office of the Civil Defense-7, strengthening youth power for mangrove protection and improve disaster preparedness by “TRIAGE Exercises” for the Camotes Islands Emergency Response Team (CiERT) Striking Force done by Central Visayas Search and Rescue (CEVSAR) are among the deliverables by local government unit of San Francisco aiming for a safer town for the next generation on this perilous time. These mention activities successfully accomplish this quarter to continue the program started by UNISDR Asia Pacific Champion Alfredo Arquillano, Jr and implemented by Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction & Management Office (MDRRMO) for community resiliency.
Community involvement count much in sustaining the town’s resiliency in facing different type of hazards brought by climate change. Recently the three major activities mentioned above that encourage a multi-sectoral participation and draws interest to individual in participating the programs for improving level of resiliency in the town.
It is proven during the “Earth Day 2013 Celebration” in a short notice to the public plus election campaign period, the MDRRMO was able to obtain volunteers from all walks of life to participate activities honoring mother earth like watering the two year old plants at Lake Danao Park, mangrove clean-up and planting with no big amount expense involved. There are groups from Camotes Island Emergency Response Team (CiERT), Camotes Off-road Bikers Association (CORBA), San Francisco Out of School Youth, San Francisco Sangguniang Kabataan (SK), Red Cross Youth, Purok Officials, Philippine National Police-San Francisco and government employees who actively joined the said event.
This year also the Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction & Management Office (MDRRMO), Department of Agriculture (DA) and the Two Million Trees Management Team finished Mangrove Assessment & Feedbacking last month. The result of the assessment became an eye opener for the community living near the coastal the importance of mangrove in preventing typhoon and storm surge. The town was able to plant almost 6,000 Bakhaw Propagules for this quarter that was mostly participated by the youth, setting up of three additional mangrove nurseries, designated three forest guard and accommodate more parents who render services to support the environmental programs in exchange of the financial support from “Education for Work Program” initiated by Mayor Aly Arquillano.
The town’s multi-sectoral efforts seen and started in the Purok System gave best example of local action for disaster reduction and contributed the realization of the numerous environmental project. The Purok system invites unified act for reducing risk and key of all town’s achievements which recently recognized by the Galing Pook Award among the 16 finalist in the nationwide search for LGU’s best practices. This notable system is soon been presented and introduce in countries such as Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador where Vice Mayor Al scheduled this May for a learning exchange before joining the Global Platform at Geneva, Switzerland this 2013.