MGB cites mining company’s CSR program in Surigao

Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB), the agency tasked to regulate the mining sector, cited the Marcventures Mining and Development Corporation (MMDC) for its scholarship program in Surigao del Sur, which has a high number of out of school youths.

As of now, 11.3 percent of young people in Caraga region are out of school.

The figure is alarmingly higher than the national average of 10.6 percent, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

Moreover, PSA said Caraga has the smallest share of higher educational institutions in the country at 2.4 percent.

"Education is a basic precondition for human development. To do this on a large-scale basis is something that other mining companies should replicate the initiative in their respective community development initiatives," MGB-Caraga director Roger de Dios said.

He then said that MMDC consistently posts the highest number of tertiary-level scholars among all mining companies in Caraga Region for years now since the agency started collating this data.

De Dios said MMDC's scholarship program, at least for the 2016 to 2017 school year, represented 22 percent of the total mining scholars in the region.

A data from MGB showed that MMDC, a subsidiary of Marcventures Holdings, Inc. (MHI), has 152 college scholars, the highest among all operating mining companies in the region.

This 2018, the company has 85 full-time scholars enrolled in different colleges and universities in Mindanao, Visayas and even Luzon.

The scholarship program is expected to produce at least -21 college graduates by the end of the current school year.

MHI President Isidro C. Alcantara assured that Marcventures will continue to “partner with our community stakeholders in the area of education."

Jose Dagala, MMDC Assistant Vice President for Social Commitments, said that number is expected to further balloon with the entry of new college scholars when the 20182019 school year opens in June (August in some universities).