Hungduan farmers benefit in PRDP project

SOME 63 piglets were turned over to 21 farmer-members Hungduan Micro-Finance Development Cooperative (HMFDC) during a turn – over during the weekend under the Department of Agriculture’s Philippine Rural Development Project (PRDP).

“Almost 85 percent of farmers’ livelihood were damaged by the calamity in 2015 and everyone needed to restore and re-establish their properties from what was left,” described Evelyn Biniahan, manager of HMFDC, on their situation and how they were able to come up with a proposal on swine raising

“When the provincial and municipal agriculture offices informed us about this project, we did our best to comply with all the requirements the soonest and waited patiently,” said Biniahan, adding the project is a great help to their members in growing their livelihood.

Each farmer were given three piglets and 21 kilograms of feeds. The remaining 87 piglets and sacks of feeds will be delivered by the end of the month to cater 29 more farmers.

According to the project’s business plan, 150 piglets and 274 sacks of feeds (starter and grower) are set to be delivered as part of the first tranche, and 144 sacks of finisher feeds for the second tranche. For one year operation of two cycles, the piglets will be fattened for a maximum of six months and will be sold at P120/kg live weight.

To sustain the

project, the total investment cost provided shall be collected from each recipient including the capital build-up scheme of one percent and another percent service fee from the sales of each pig. Likewise, the HMFDC shall strictly impose policies in the implementation of the project.

During the turnover ceremony, Nazario Tuguinay of the Provincial Agriculturist Office stressed it is their obligation as recipients to take care of the project and make it sustainable.

“They have required us to comply with a lot of documents before we were able to acquire funds for this project and each of us have responsibilities and obligations to fulfill,” said Tuguinay.

Meanwhile, the supplier of the piglets committed to conduct regular visits to tend to the needs of the piglets that were delivered.

With a counterpart from the cooperative (in-kind) amounting to more than P300,000.00, the livelihood project on swine raising costs P1, 138,000.00 shared by the World Bank (80%), the Government of the Philippines (20%), and the Provincial LGU (20%).