BOY SCOUTS, DA PUSH URBAN GARDENING

TO help ensure adequate food supply during the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic, the Boy Scouts of the Philippines (BSP), in cooperation with the Department of Agriculture (DA), recently launched an urban gardening project in the National Capital Region and places where the community quarantine is still in place.

BSP President Roberto Pagdanganan inked a memorandum of agreement with Agriculture

Secretary William Dar, under which the BSP will cooperate with the department’s Urban Agriculture Project in line with the agency’s AhonLahat,PagkainSapatKontra Covid-19 program.

Pagdanganan said the project is the BSP’s contribution to Republic Act 11469 or the “Bayanihan to Heal as One Act.”

“In this time of uncertainty, we are mobilizing our SCOUTS to pursue a mandate promoting and encouraging, through organization and cooperation with other agencies, their ability to do useful things for themselves and others as we train them in Scoutcraft and inculcate in them civic-consciousness and self-reliance, kindred virtues and moral values,” he added.

Under the agreement, the Agriculture department will provide seeds, soil and other gardening tools; lead the advocacy campaign; and give technical assistance to participants.

The BSP will identify suitable gardening plots in urban areas and assign personnel to manage the garden and volunteers to sustain the project in pilot areas.

BSP Secretary General Rogelio Villa Jr. said the project is open to all scouts and scout leaders who can launch the project in their home, school and other parts of communities where gardening is possible.